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LIFE 



OP 



ROGER WILLIAMS, 



FOUNDER OF THE STATE OP RHODE ISLAND. 

BY 

WILLIAM GAIMIMELL, A.M. 

PROFESSOR IN BROWN UNIVERSITY. 



" Roger Williams justly claims the honor of having been the 
first legislator in the world, in its latter ages, that fully and eflfect- 
ually provided for, and established a full, free, and absolute lib- 
erty of conscience." Gov. Hopkins. 



BOSTON: 
GOULD AND LINCOLN, 

59 WASHINGTON STREET. 
1854. 



T7 






Ent«ed according to act of Congress, in the year 1845, by 

Charles C. Little and James Broww, 

in the Clerk's office of the District Court of the District of MassachUMtta 



PREFACE 



In preparing the following sketch of Roger 
Williams, the writer has consulted nearly all the 
works of New England history, from which ma- 
terials might be derived for the illustration of 
his life and character. He is, however, by far 
the most indebted to the elaborate " Memoir," 
prepared by the late Mr. Knowles, a work of 
great fulness and accuracy of information re- 
spectmg not only the immediate subject to which 
it relates, but also the general affairs of New 
England in that early age. This work, which 
probably contains all that can now be known 
concerning the life of the calumniated founder 
of Rhode Island, renders the task of a subse- 
quent biographer comparatively easy. The nar- 
rative of Mr. Knowles has been generally com- 
pared with the original authorities on which he 
relies, and in all cases his statements have been 
found to be correct. 

In selecting and arranging the materials, 
which are thus supplied, the aim of the 
present writer has been, to confine himself to 



4 PREFACE. 

those which are best fitted to illustrate the per 
sonal character of this eminent man, and to 
furnish the means of estimating aright the ser- 
vices he rendered to his own and to subse- 
quent times. He has sought to give a plain 
and faithful narrative of a series of events, 
which seem the more remarkable, as, by the 
lapse of time, we are further separated from the 
period in which they occurred. These events, 
indeed, furnish a sad and perplexing commen- 
tary upon the principles of the Puritans, while 
they serve to impart the aspect of heroism to 
the life of him, whom the Puritans persecuted 
and banished. They are now well understood, 
and are regarded as, in some sense, among the 
anomalies of history ; yet they can never lose 
their interest and importance. So long as men 
shall continue to differ on religious subjects, and 
require the exercise of Christian charity and lib- 
erality, so long may they learn lessons of the 
highest practical value from the life of him, who 
has been justly styled " the apostle of religious 
liberty." 



CONTENTS. 



LIFE OF ROGER WILLIAMS. 

BY WILLIAM GAMMELL. 

Pkg». 

Preface 3 

CHAPTER I. 

His early Life. — His Education. — The Influ' 
ences that formed his Character and Opinions. 

— He arrives at Boston 6 

CHAPTER n. 

The Puritan Settlements in Massachusetts. — 
The Principles on which they were founded. 

— The Views of Williams. — The Charges of 
the Magistrates against him. — His Settlement 
at Salem. — His Removal to Plymouth^ and 

the Cause ...... 13 

CHAPTER HI. 

His Reception at Plymouth. — His Discontent 
there, and Return to Salem. — Results of his 
Residence at Plymouth. — The Puritans* Dread 
of Anabaptists 21 



VI CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER IV. 

His secojid Residence in Salem. — His Disap- 
probation of the Ministers^ Meeting. — Trea^ 
tise concerning the King''s Patent. — Troubles 
with the Magistrates on Account of it. — Con- 
duct of Williams. — He preaches upon the 
Duty of Women''s wearing Veils. — Also 
against the Cross in the Military Colors. — 
His Character and Standing in Salem. . . 28 

CHAPTER V. 

His Doctrine of the Freedom of Conscience. — 
The Difficulty in which it involves him with 
the Clergy and Magistrates. — His Opposition 
to the Freeman'' s Oath. — The Persecution of 
the Magistrates extends to the People of Sa- 
lem. — He is deserted by his Church. — The 
Judgment of the Clergy. — The Decree of 
Banishment. — He leaves Salem. . 38 

CHAPTER VI. 

His Wanderings after his Banishment. — He 
visits Massasoit, and begins a Settlement at 
Seekonk. — He crosses the River, and lays the 
Foundations of Providence 54 

CHAPTER Vn. 

The principal Indian Tribes of New England. 
-^ Williams'' s Intercourse with them. — His 



CONTENTS, VU 

Views of their Rights, and his Influence with 
them. — Freedom of the Colony at Providence. 

— Its Government limited to civil Things. — 
Circumstances in which Williams is placed. . 65 

CHAPTER VIII. 

The Pcquot War. — The Services Williams ren- 
ders the Government of Massachusetts. — His 
Agency saves the Colonies from Destruction. 

— His Letter to Governor Winthrop. — Issue 
of the War. — Manner in lohich his Services 

are regarded by 3Iassachusetts 79 

CHAPTER IX. 

Inadequacy of Legislation for the Suppression of 
Heresy. — Account of Mrs. Hutchinson and 
her Controversy in Massachusetts. — Her Ad- 
herents are received at Providence. — They 
settle on Rhode Island. — Williams'' s Agency 
in the Purchase of the Island. — Relations of 
the Colony at Providence with 3Iassachusetts. 

— Account of Samuel Gorton. — His Settle- 
ment at Pawtuxet. — His Difficulties with the 
People of Providence 94 

CHAPTER X. 

The New England Confederacy. — The Colo- 
nies in Rhode Island excluded. — They appeal 
to the King. — Williams is appointed their ., 
Agent, and sails for England. — Obtains a 
Charter. — Publishes the Bloody Tenet. — 



VIU CONTENTS. 

He returns to Rhode Island with the Char^ 
ter, — His Reception at Providence. — His 
Pacification of the Indians. — Organization 
of a Government under the Charter. — Spirit 
of its early Legislation .113 

CHAPTER XI. 

Private Life of Williams.'— Dissensions in Rhode 
Island. — Coddington^s Commission. — Op- 
pressive Policy of the United Colonies. — 
Treatinent of John Clarke and others in Mas- 
sachusctts. — Dissatisfaction with Coddington. 

— Williams and Clarke are appointed Agents 

of the Colony. — They sail for England. . 130 

CHAPTER XII. 

State of public Affairs in England. — Williams's 
Occupations while there. — Coddington' s Com- 
mission revoked. — Letter of the General As- 
sembly to Williams. — His Intercourse with Sir 
Henry Vane, Cromwell, and 3Iilton. — His 
literary Labors. — His Return to Providence. 

— Reorganization of the Government. — He 

IS elected President of the Colony. ... 144 

CHAPTER XIII. 

Character of his Administration. — He acts as 

Mediator bctvjeen the United Colonics and the 

^ Indians. — Spirit of Disorder in the Colony. 

— Williams's Letter to the Town of Provi- 
dence. — Conduct of William Harris. — ^Vil- 



CONTENTS. IX 

Hams attempts to conciliate the other Colonies. 

— TJieir Efforts to compel Rhode Island to 
persecute the Quakers. — Her liberal Policy 
towards them 160 

CHAPTER XIV. 

He retires from the Presidency. — Oliarles the 
Second grants a new Charter to the Colony 

— Williams appointed an Assistant in the 
Government. — His Labors for the Indians. — 
His Controversy loith the Quakers. — King 
Philip^ s War. — The Services of Williams 
during the War. — Its Results. — The Close 

of his Life, and his Death 178 

CHAPTER XV. 

His religious Opinions. — His Views respecting 
the Clergy. — Political Opinions. — Character 
as a Writer. — General Remarks 19'' 



APPENDIX. 

No. I. — Charges against Rhode Island. . . . 209 
No. II. — Account of Roger Williams's Writings. 212 



L 1 Jb L 



ROGER WILLIAMS 



WILLIAM GAMMFLL. 



ROGER WILLIAMS 



CHAPTER I. 



His early Life. — His Education. — The Injlu* 
ences that formed his Character and Opinions. 
— He arrives at Boston. 

Our only knowledge of the life of Roger 
Williams, previous to his arrival in America, is 
derived from tradition; and even this tradition 
rests upon no very certain evidence. No allu- 
sion is found in his writings, nor has any trace 
of documentary history been discovered, which 
can guide us to definite information concerning 
this period of his life. His peculiarities of opin- 
ion, and his subsequent exclusion from the sym- 
pathies of the colonies, undoubtedly contributed 
to render the interest of the early annalists of 
New England, in his personal history, far less 
than in that of most of the other leading men 
of his time. Not one of them appears to have 
taken any pains to inquire into his origin, or to 



6 AMERICAN BIOGRAPfiy. 

preserve, for the gratification of posterity, any 
account of his hfe and fortunes while Hving in 
Great Britain. 

According to the traditions which have been 
preserved concerning him, he was born in Wales, 
in the year 1599. His parents were in the mid- 
dle ranks of life, but of the character and cir- 
cumstances of his family, or of the place of his 
birth, nothing can now be ascertained. He is 
said to have received his education at the uni- 
versity of Oxford, under the patronage of Sir 
Edward Coke, whose interest in him was first 
excited by an incident, which may have been 
characteristic of the early bias of his mind. He 
was struck with the young man's appearance at 
church, and his devout attention during public 
worship, and one day found that he was taking 
notes of the sermon. Sir Edward afterwards 
sent for him, and became so well pleased with 
his talents and character, that he obtained per- 
mission of his parents to place him at one of 
the colleges at Oxford. His name, however, 
cannot now be found on any of the rolls of the 
university, and, from the fact that Sir Edward 
Coke was himself a graduate of Cambridge, it 
bas been doubted whether Williams did not 
also receive his education at the same seat of 
learning. 

The whole of the tradition relating to the 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 



patronage of Sir Edward Coke may well be 
called ill question ; for, at best, it rests upon no 
very satisfactory foundation. It is certain, how- 
ever, from li's own statements, as well as from 
the character of his writings, that Mr. Williams 
received a classical education, and it is in a 
very high degree probable, that he pursued his 
studies at one of the famous seats of learning, 
which, until a recent period, have given to Eng- 
land nearly all her educated men. After the 
close of his residence at the university, he is 
said to have commenced the study of the law, 
under the guidance of his illustrious patron ; but 
his inclinations, which were early subjected to 
the influence of strong religious feelings, led him 
soon to abandon this pursuit, and enter upon 
the study of theology. This was a study, which 
largely engrossed the minds of most of the edu- 
cated men of that age, and to which the growth 
and culture of his own spiritual nature had al- 
ready given him a decided and controlling bias, 
" From my childhood," says he, near the close 
of his life, '' now above threescore years, the 
Father of hghts and mercies touched my soul 
with a love to himself, to his only-begotten, 
the true Lord Jesus, and to his Holy Scriptures." 
The religious character, whose germs were thus 
early planted, gi-ew and ripened with his years, 
amidst the retirement of his secluded studies, 



8 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

and bore fruits in a life of piety and vn'tue, 
which won for him the respect and confidence 
of those with whom he was associated. His 
mind was enriched and expanded with the best 
learning of the age ; and it is probable, that his 
preparation for the sacred profession to which 
he was looking forward, was, for the time, un- 
usually thorough and complete. He was admit- 
ted to orders in the established church, though 
it is not known by what bishop, or in what 
year, he was ordained. It is also said, that he 
was appointed to the charge of a parish, while 
in England ; but of this no mention whatever 
is made in his writings, which now exist. 

But, though so little can now be ascertained 
concerning his personal career in early life, yet 
the history of that troubled and exciting period 
of English affairs enables us to form no doubt- 
ful estimate of the influences that lent their aid 
in forming his opinions and shaping his char- 
acter. He had grown to manhood at a time 
when society in England was in one of those 
transition states, which mark the departure of 
an old and the forming of a new era. The 
principles of the reformation, which had first 
been preached in England by Wickliffe and his 
followers, were slowly and silently working out 
their legitimate results in the institutions both 
of the church and tlie state, not less than in the 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 9 

minds of the people. Their influence was re- 
sisted by the prerogative of the monarch and the 
power of tlie hierarchy, and the rites of a cor- 
rupted church were still imposed, by statutes of 
uniformity, upon the free consciences of English- 
men. The great contest, which had commenced 
with the reformation, between the worn-out 
forms of a preceding age and the principles of 
civil and religious freedom, was at that time 
waged with unabated zeal. It is evident, from 
numerous passages in his subsequent writings, 
that Roger Williams, while in England, was no 
indifferent spectator of the events which marked 
the age. Into the controversy which then di- 
vided the English church, he had undoubtedly 
thrown himself with all the energy of his ardent 
and sanguine temperament. He had thoroughly 
studied the principles at issue between the two 
parties, and, with no wavering faith, had em- 
braced the tenets of the persecuted Puritans, 
who then constituted the most pious portion of 
the established church. He thus became the 
associate and friend of Cotton and Hooker, and 
seems to have had occasional intercourse with 
Vane and Cromwell. 

But, in addition to the views which he held 
in common with these and other eminent Puri- 
tans of his time, the lessons of history, and the 
workings of his clear and far-seeing mind, had 



10 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

forced upon his conviction another principle, 
which, even before he left his native country, 
had settled itself firmly in his faith. This prin- 
ciple w^as the inalienable freedom of the con- 
science, the responsibility of man to God alone 
in all matters of religious belief and worship. 
It had been held, and occasionally asserted, in 
some modified form, by the friends of freedom 
in a former age, and w^as, indeed, a legitimate 
result of the spirit and doctrines of the reforma- 
tion ; but in the mind of Roger Williams alone, 
in modern times, does it appear to have been 
first conceived in the length and breadth of its 
universal application. 

Holding such views, it is not surprising that 
he should have been among the earhest to join 
the bands of emigrants, who were preparing to 
seek an asylum for their persecuted worship 
upon the shores of New England. Some of his 
acquaintances had already preceded him to the 
new world, while the Puritans, in every part of 
England, were looking with anxious interest to 
the colonies, which had thus been planted be- 
yond the sea. Yielding to the general impulse 
which then so widely prevailed, he embarked at 
Bristol, on the 1st of December, 1630, in the 
ship Lion, Captain Pierce, master, (the same ship, 
which, in successive passages, bore so many of 
the emigrants to New England,) and, after a 



ROGER WILLIAMS. ' 

tempestuous voyage of sixty-six days, arrived at 
Boston, on the Sth of February, 1631. 

He was now in the thirty-second year of his 
age, and in the full maturity of all his powers, 
having already acquired a reputation for elo- 
quence and piety, which had spread widely in 
England, and had preceded him to America. 
His arrival at Boston is mentioned by Governor 
Winthrop, in his Journal, as of " a godly min- 
ister," and was doubtless hailed, by the churches 
of the infant settlements of Massachusetts Bay, 
as an accession to their strength of the precious 
gifts of piety and learning. They little antici- 
pated the startling doctrines he would put forth ; 
and he had no intimation of the singular destiny, 
that was preparing for him, amid the unknown 
wilderness to which he had come. 

When he embarked at Bristol, he had been 
recently married, and was accompanied by his 
wife, Mrs. Mary Williams, a lady, who lived to 
share his changeful fortunes among the check- 
ered scenes through which he subsequently 
parsed, but of whose early history even less is 
known than of that of her husband. 



12 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY, 



CHAPTER II. 

The Puritan Settlements in Massachusetts. — 
The Principles on ivhich they were founded. 
— The Views of Williams. — The Charges of 
the Magistrates against him. — His Settlement 
at Salem. — His Removal to Plymouth^ and 
the Cause. 

The settlements composing the colony ol 
Massachusetts Bay were established in the year 
1628, and the two years following. The first 
company of emigrants settled at Salem in 1628, 
and was under the direction of the enterprising 
and fearless Endicott. In the year 1630, there 
arrived in the bay another band of Pilgrims, 
who, like their brethren of Plymouth, had al- 
ready organized a commonwealth, and elected 
their officers, under a charter from the King, 
which henceforth was to be administered within 
the territory of the colony, of whose existence 
and rights it contained the guaranty. This com- 
pany was by far the most wealthy and most 
cultivated of all the bands of emigrants, who 
had yet arrived in New England. There were 
among its members men of large hereditary 
fortune, and of gentle blood ; scholars versed 
in all the learning of the times ; civilians long 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 13 

practised in the study of public affairs ; and 
clergymen whose learning and piety had won 
the highest respect of their parishes in England 
At the head of all was Winthrop, whom they 
had chosen Governor, a man of the noblest 
virtues, whose warm enthusiasm was tempered 
by mild and gentle benevolence, and whose 
bland and high-bred manners were fitted to 
command the love and respect of his associates, 
and, even amidst the privations of the wilderness, 
to throw an air of dignity and a charm of pro- 
priety over every scene of life upon which he 
entered. 

We may well pause, for a moment, to con- 
sider the principles which the fathers of Massa- 
chusetts had incorporated into their common- 
wealth, and upon which they had erected the 
fabric of their society. It is a mistake, as has 
often been remarked, to suppose that they came 
to New England with any notions of unlimited 
freedom of conscience. It was no part of their 
aim, in bidding farewell to their native island, 
to build, across the ocean, an asylum for the 
persecuted of every name. Even the possibility of 
such a state of society had never dawned upon 
their minds. " The emigrants," as has justly 
been said, " were a body of sincere believers, 
desiring purity of religion, not a colony of philos- 
ophers, bent upon universal toleration." They 



14 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

had come to " this outside of the world," as 
they deemed it, to enjoy, unmolested, their own 
worship, and to practise, without hinderance or 
restraint, the principles of their own faith. They 
were generally members of the established church 
of England, but desired that the principles of 
the reformation should be applied still more 
thoroughly to purify her doctrines, and elevate 
and spiritualize her w^orship. It was to escape 
oppression for themselves, not to secure the boon 
of freedom to others ; to carry into practice their 
own views of Christian worship, and their own 
doctrines of civil liberty, not to open a temple for 
the disciples of every faith and the adherents of 
every creed ; that they had braved the ocean 
and the wilderness, and begun to plant their civil 
and religious institutions beneath these unpropi- 
tious skies. 

To secure the accomplishment of this object, 
the dearest which their hearts could cherish, all 
their legislation was designed, and all the ar- 
rangements of their society were framed. It 
was in accordance with this, that they reserved 
to themselves the right of admitting only whom 
they pleased as freemen of the colony ; and within 
a little more than a year after their arrival, they 
" ordered and agreed that, for time to come, no 
man should be admitted to the freedom of the 
body politic, but such as are members of some 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 15 

of the churches within the hmits of the same.'' 
It was the aspiration of the Puritans to form a 
Christian republic, after the model of the Jewish 
theocracy, in which the laws of Moses should 
constitute the rules of civil life. Their system, 
thus educed from the highest sources of author- 
ity, tolerated no contradiction and allowed of 
no dissent. The mandates of public sentiment, 
not less than the enactments of the General 
Court, in the infant colony, were as stern and 
unyielding as had been the statutes of uniformity, 
from whose tyrannical operation they had fled 
when they embarked for the shores of the new 
world. Wrapped in their singular and somewhat 
original social system there lay the germs both 
of immense good and immense evil ; of a moral 
energy that was to bless the world by the re- 
sults it has produced, and of dissensions that 
were to rend their youthful republic, and kindle 
the fires of intolerance and fanaticism even upon 
the spots most sacred to freedom. 

Such were the principles on which the colony 
of Massachusetts Bay had been founded, and 
such was its spirit during the first year of its 
existence, in the course of which Roger Wil- 
liams landed upon its shores, and became one 
of its residents. Like the colonists who had 
preceded him, he had come hither for conscience* 
sake, to find, for the profession and the practice 



16 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

of his religious faith, a freedom which England 
had refused to grant. Here, then, we may well 
suppose, Mr. Williams had expected to realize 
the visions of his imagination, and find a state of 
society in which he could cherish and express 
the great doctrines which had taken full poiS- 
session of his soul. He was among those with 
whom, in the essential points of Christian faith 
and morals, he entirely agreed. In the applica- 
tions of his great principle of the freedom of 
conscience, however, there were constantly pre- 
sented occasions of infinite disagreement. 

Scarcely had he stepped ashore at Boston, 
when he found the whole civil and ecclesiasti- 
cal authorities of Massachusetts arrayed in hos- 
tility against him. In the asylum of the exiled 
Puritans, intolerance had also found a home. 
The same odious principle, which, by uniting 
the church with the civil power, had given rise 
to all the persecutions, that, during three cen- 
turies, had stained the soil of England with 
martyrs' blood, and driven into exile some of the 
master-spirits of her people, was also incorporated 
into the society of the New England Pilgrims. 
Its form and aspect, indeed, were changed, 
but its spirit was still the same. Its action was 
chastened by the straitened circumstances of 
exile, and of an infant state ; but it still author- 
ized the civil magistrate to watch over the opin 



il G E R W 1 L L I A. M S . 17 

ions of men, to punish for errors of doctrine, and 
for neglect of religious duties, and was destined, 
by its subsequent applications, to destroy the har- 
mony and quiet of the New England colonies, 
and to fix upon the escutcheon of some of them 
the foulest stains. 

A few weeks after his arrival, Mr. Williams 
was invited by the church at Salem to become 
assistant to their pastor, the Reverend Mr. Skel- 
ton ; but the magistrates of the colony had heard 
of his opinions, and immediately interposed their 
remonstrances with the people of Salem to pre- 
vent his settlement. The reasons of this inter- 
ference on the part of the authorities, as alleged 
in the letter, which they addressed to the church 
at Salem, are, first, that Mr. Williams had re- 
fused to join with the congregation at Boston, 
because they would not declare their repentance 
for having had communion with the churches of 
England while they lived there ; secondly, that 
he " had declared his opinion, that the magistrate 
might not punish a breach of the Sabbath, nor 
any other offence that was a breach of the first 
table." 

W^ith respect to the former of these jfeharges, 
it is difficult now to determine, precisely, how 
much importance he attached to the sin of which 
he thus called the Boston church to declare 
their repentance. It is, however, certain that 

VOL. IV. 2 



18 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

he was not alone in thinking the Puritans had 
done wrong in holding communion with those 
whose power and resources were constantly em- 
ployed in crushing the spirit of true piety in 
England. It was, in his estimation, allowing a 
compromise with sin. It was lending an indi- 
rect sanction and connivance to a church, whose 
usages he deemed corrupt, and whose govern- 
ment he regarded as tyranny. Whatever views 
may now be entertained of this sentiment, it will 
scarcely be pretended that it furnished any 
ground for the magistrates to prevent the settle- 
ment of Mr. Williams in the ministry to which 
he had been ordained, and to which he was now 
called by the suffrages of the church in Salem. 
The second of the above charges, it will be 
seen, relates to liis declaration of the great doc- 
trine, to the vindication and elucidation of which 
he was to devote his life. His doctrine was in 
direct conflict with both the opinions and the 
practices of the colony of Massachusetts, whose 
counsellors and elders considered themselves the 
appointed guardians of the orthodoxy of the oeo- 
ple ; and in that age they could conceive of 
no other mode of executing their trust, than by 
inflicting civil penalties upon every one who 
ventured to dissent even in the most unimpor- 
tant particulars from the prevailing faith. The 
opinion of Roger Williams, which was then urged 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 19 

in proof of his unsuitableness to become a min- 
ister of the gospel, has long since become the 
common sentiment of the American people, and 
is fast spreading itself over the civilized world, 
everywhere, in its course, giving peace to the 
distracted elements of society, and placing on a 
sure basis the institutions both of government 
and rehgion. 

Mr. Williams, however, had already removed 
to Salem, where, on the 12th of April, 1631, he 
was settled as a minister of the church, not- 
withstanding the opposition of the magistrates, 
who at the time were assembled at Boston. On 
the 18th of the following May, after having 
been duly propounded, he was admitted a free- 
man of the colony, and took the usual oath of 
allegiance prescribed in such cases. He was 
now, in the fullest sense of the word, a citizen 
of the colony, and one of the ministers of its 
oldest church. He had thus identified himself 
with its interests by the most significant acts 
which a citizen can perform, and was doubtless 
as ready to labor in its service, and to share its 
burdens, as any of those w^ho had been appointed 
to preside over its affairs. The people of Salem 
had extended to him their confidence, and his 
life and ministry there had confirmed their re- 
spect and attachment, and were giving promise 



20 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

of a long career, as their guide, and teacher, and 
friend. 

But his settlement here was destined to be 
brought to an early close. The act of the 
church in calling him to be their minister, con- 
trary to the advice of the Governor and General 
Court, had awakened tlie stern displeasure of 
those functionaries, and was not easily forgiven. 
His own opinions, also, which he had taken no 
pains to disguise, had excited the suspicions of 
the magistrates and elders of the colony ; and, 
true to their united trust, as the guardians of 
the popular faith, they did not allow him to re- 
main in peace at a post to which he had been 
invited in disregard of their wishes and advice. 
For the sake of private opinions, therefore, which 
did not in the least affect his relations to the 
civil power, as a citizen, he and his church were 
continually harassed and disturbed. At length, 
after the lapse of a few months, as is thought, 
at the close of the summer, he removed from 
Salem, and sought a residence in the colony of 
Plymouth, beyond the persecuting jurisdiction of 
the Court of Massachusetts Bay. This removal 
was undoubtedly dictated by prudence and a de- 
sire for peace and quiet, and was not the result 
of his own independent choice ; for in the ven- 
erable pastory; and among the people of Salem, 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 21 

he had found friends, whose interests in his 
ministry, respect for his character, and attention 
to his welfare, had enhsted in their behalf his 
warmest feelings of regard, which he long con- 
tinued to cherish. 



CHAPTER III. 



His Reception at Plymouth, — His Discontent 
there, and Return to Salem. — Results of his 
Residence at Plymouth. — The Puritans^ Dread 
of Anabaptists. 

Mr. Williams removed to Plymouth prob- 
ably in the month of August, 1631. He was 
received there with the respect which his repu- 
tation as a minister, and his high personal char- 
acter, were so well calculated to call forth. He 
was entertained by the Governor and the lead- 
ing citizens, and after some time, having been ad- 
mitted to the church, was settled as assistant 
to the pastor, the Reverend Ralph Smith. The 
Puritans who had come over in the Mayflower, 
and settled at Plymouth, had, from the first, 
manifested a more liberal spirit than their neigh- 
bors, who had subsequently settled in the Bay. 



22 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

Before they embarked upon their perilous voy 
age, they had resided for some time in Hol- 
land, and become entirely alienated from the 
established church of England. It is probable 
that, on this account, the views of Roger Wil- 
liams, concerning the propriety of holding com- 
munion with that church, were, to say the least, 
less offensive to them tlian to their brethren of 
Massachusetts. However this may have been, 
they seem to have been ready to receive him 
among them with the most cordial fellowship; 
and with more than usual attention and respect. 
Governor Bradford says his teaching was '' well 
approved, for the benefit whereof," he adds, ''I 
shall bless God, and am thankful to him ever 
for his sharpest admonitions and reproofs, so far 
as they agreed with truth." 

But though he- had now fixed his residence 
beyond the jurisdiction of the Court of Massa- 
chusetts, he had not removed from the reach of 
that disposition which displays itself in every 
age, and in all conditions of society, to dis- 
trust and annoy those who are in advance of 
prevailing opinions, or at variance with existing 
institutions. It is the usual destiny of such men 
to be misunderstood and suspected by their 
contemporaries, and often to be proscribed as 
the enemies of the state, even while they are 
studiously cherishing its dearest interests. Thus 



R C E R \V I L L I A M S . 23 

was it with Roger Williams at Plymouth. His 
sentiments of freedom, and his earnest declara- 
tion of the rights of the soul, though they seem 
never to have provoked the action either of the 
church or of the civil authorities, were not long 
in awakening the suspicions of the principal men 
of the colony. It is probable, also, that many 
were the more ready to detect the heresy that 
lurked in his views on this subject, from a sym- 
pathy with their brethren of the neighboring 
colony, and a knowledge of the reputation he 
had acquired as the advocate of a dangerous 
freedom while resident at Boston and Salem. 
So faithful, however, was his preaching, so ex- 
emplary and beneficent was his daily life, that 
he retained the affections and respect of the 
people, even while many of them were distrust- 
ful of the liberal principles, which he promul- 
gated. His own feehngs, however, were never 
so strongly enlisted in the people of Plymouth, 
as they had been in those of the town where 
he had first been settled as a minister of the 
gospel. It may be, indeed, that he had never 
regarded his removal to Plymouth as anything 
more than a temporary retirement from the storm 
of an excited and virulent pubhc sentiment in 
the sister colony. His heart still turned to Sa- 
lem, and longed to renew the hopes and the 
interests with which he had first entered upon 



24 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

his ministry there ; and, accordingly, after an ab- 
sence of about two years, on receiving an invi- 
tation from the people of that town to resume 
his place among them, he left Plymouth in the 
month of August of the year 1633. 

His residence at Plymouth, brief though it was, 
had yet been marked by incidents of no incon- 
siderable importance in their bearing upon his 
subsequent career and destiny. It was here, 
that his first child was born, a daughter, who 
received her mother's name, and, we may natu- 
rally suppose, constituted another most tender tie, 
that bound him to his family and his home. But 
the most important among the incidents of his life 
at Plymouth were the intercourse he held, and 
the friendly intimacy he formed, with some of 
the most celebrated chiefs of the various Indian 
tribes, who came to promote alliance and prose- 
cute trade with the colonists of New England. 
Here he won the regard of the venerable Mas- 
sasoit, the father of King Philip, and chief of 
the Wampanoags, who, from the seat of his royal 
race at Mount Hope, had often gone to brighten, 
by friendly intercourse, the chain that bound him 
to his early allies. Here, too, he conversed with 
the Narragansett w^arriors, whose stern chiefs, the 
aged and w^ise Canonicus, and the fierce though 
generous Miantonomo, had broken through the 
shyness of savage life, and sought to conciliate 



R G E R W I L L I A M S . 25 

the favor of their new neighbors. It is probable, 
also, that, at this period of his life,. he made 
excursions into the domains of these wild war- 
riors, and, in the rude cabins of the natives, 
studied their strange characters and their man- 
ner of life, and acquired the rudiments of their 
uncouth language. In a letter written many 
years afterwards, he says, " God was pleased to 
give me a painful, patient spirit, to lodge with 
them in their filthy, smoky holes, even while. I 
lived at Plymouth and Salem, to gain their 
tongue." The knowledge which he thus ac- 
quired, and the friendships with the chiefs which 
he thus cemented, proved of incalculable ad- 
vantage to him, in the days when he was driven 
forth an exile from the homes of civilized men, 
to wander in the wintry forest, and seek, in the 
comfortless dwellings of the heathen, the pro- 
tection and the charities which Christians had 
denied to him. 

It is probable, also, that this acquaintance with 
the Indians served to call his attention more 
particularly to their moral condition, and to enlist 
his earliest interest in their religious instruction, 
and their conversion to Christianity. '•' My soul's 
desire," says he, " was to do the natives good ; " 
and his whole life, passed amidst the perils and 
privations of the wilderness, and in deeds of justice 



26 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

and beneficence to its rude dwellers, proves the 
sincerity of his desire. 

At the time when Mr. Williams asked a dis- 
mission from the church at Plymouth, many of 
its members sought to dissuade him from his 
design of removing from the colony, and were 
reluctant to grant his request. He was, at 
length, however, dismissed, at the instance of 
Mr. Brewster, the ruling elder, who, probably, 
disliking his views, urged upon the church that 
he held dangerous opinions, and was even taint- 
ed with the heresy of Anabaptism ; and, if he 
remained among them, " might run the same 
course of rigid separation and Anabaptistry " as 
had a " Sebaptist" of the name of John Smyth, 
whom they had known in Holland. 

Of all the forms of heresy known in that age, 
none, save Papacy alone, seems to have been so 
frightful to the imagination of the Puritans as 
Anabaptism ; a term which defined, in some 
vague manner, the views of a sect who bap- 
tized again those who united with them from 
other denominations. A portion of those con- 
nected with this sect in Germany, about the mid- 
dle of the sixteenth century, embracing the doc- 
trines of civil freedom, and led on by demagogues 
and fanatics, had united with Catholics and Lu- 
therans in a fierce and sanguinary contest against 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 



27 



their feudal masters, and waged for years the fu- 
rious strife known as the Rustic War. So deter- 
mined were their bravery and perseverance, and so 
wide-spread was tlie dismay which their fanatical 
insurrection had caused, that their supposed tenets 
and character had come to be regarded with 
horror throughout the Christian world. They 
had always contended most strenuously against 
all prescriptive right, whether of priest or of 
king; and the doctrines of republican liberty, 
and of individual independence, which they as- 
sociated with their religious faith, were generally 
regarded, in that age when the divine right of 
kings had scarcely been questioned, as the germs 
of every species of anarchy and disorder. 

The very mention of the name of Anabap- 
tism called up a train of phantoms, that never 
failed to excite the apprehensions of the early 
Puritans. Hence it was, that when Mr. Brev/s- 
ter suggested even the remotest association of 
Roger Williams with this heresy, the church 
at Plymouth were easily induced to grant the 
dismission which he had requested. A consid- 
erable number of its members, however, who 
had become attached to his ministry, were also 
dismissed at the same time, and removed with 
him to Salem. 



28 



AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY 



CHAPTER IV. 

Jlis second Residence in Salem. — His Disap' 
probation of the Ministers^ Meeting. — Trea- 
tise concerning the King^s Patent. — Troubles 
with the Magistrates on Account of it. — Cori' 
duct of Williams. — He preaches upon the 
Duty of Women^s wearing Veils. — Also 
against the Cross in the Military Colors. — 
His Character and Standing in Salem. 

The early historians of the colony of Massa- 
chusetts Bay have displayed far greater zeal in 
setting forth the errors of doctrine imputed to 
Roger Williams, than in framing any connected 
narrative of the events with which he was so in- 
timately associated. They have with one accord 
been eager to vindicate the proceedings of the 
magistrates against him, but seem never to have 
imagined that so troublesome a person would 
ever become an object of interest to posterity, 
and still less that his most offensive principles 
would ever be regarded as the birthright of 
humanity. Hence there is a singular confusion 
of dates in the accounts, which have been given 
of his second residence in Salem ; and, in nar- 
rating the events of this important period of his 
life, we cannot always be sure that we are fol- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 29 

lowing the order of time, or pursuing the per- 
manent relations of historical cause and effect. 

Mr. Williams probably returned to Salem, as 
has already been mentioned, in the latter part 
of August of the year 1633. He resided there 
a year after his removal from Plymouth, exer- 
cising his ministry '' by way of prophecy," as it 
was termed, before he was settled as pastor of 
the church. This event took place on the death 
of his aged friend, Mr. Skelton, in the summer 
of 1634. During this year, however, he was 
often harassed by the magistrates and elders 
of the colony, and was more than once sum- 
moned before the General Court to answer for 
his opinions. 

Soon after his return to Salem, we find him 
joining with his associate in the church, the 
Reverend Mr. Skelton, in calling in question the 
expediency of a meeting of ministers, which had 
been estabUshed in the colony for the discussion 
of questions in theology, and for other similar 
purposes of mutual improvement. The ground 
of the exception thus taken by the Salem min- 
isters is alleged by Governor Winthrop to have 
been, a fear '^ that it might grow, in time, to a 
presbytery, or superintendency, to the prejudice 
of the churches' liberties." This apprehension 
indicates a mind jealous of the interests of lib- 
erty, and, perhaps, somewhat incUned to mag- 



30 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

nify the perils to which it is always exposed 
from clerical or ecclesiastical associations. The 
apprehension was undoubtedly groundless ; yet 
it will scarcely be denied, that it was the nat- 
ural result of an experience such as that of 
Roger Williams had been, both in England and 
the colonies. It served to strengthen, and call 
forth more fully, the suspicions of his orthodoxy, 
which had already been awakened in the minds 
of the clergy, and was doubtless one in the 
long train of circumstances, that led on the pro- 
ceedings against him. 

But it was not alone in trifling matters like 
this, that the suspicious vigilance of the magis- 
trates and the elders found occasions on which 
to display itself. The workings of his free and 
fearless mind soon gave cause for more serious 
offence. During his residence at Plymouth, he 
had drawn up and presented to the Governor 
and Council of that colony, a treatise on the 
nature of the right claimed by the monarchs of 
the several nations of Christendom to dispose 
of the countries of barbarous tribes, by virtue 
of discovery. In this treatise, says Governor 
Winthrop, "among other things, he disputed 
their right to the land they possessed, and con 
eluded, that, claiming by the King's grant, they 
could have no title, nor otherwise, except they 
compounded with the natives." The offensive 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 31 

manuscript, though it had never been pubHshed, 
and was not even written in Massachusetts, he 
was yet required to deliver to the Governor for 
examination ; and, as was usual in all the im- 
portant proceedings of the colonial government, 
the advice of the ministers was taken, and he 
was ordered to appear at the next Court, to re- 
ceive censure. In the treatise he had written, 
there were, the Governor proceeds to say, " three 
passages whereat they were much offended. 
First, for that he chargeth King James to have 
told a solemn public lie, because in his patent 
he blessed God, that he was the first Christian 
prince that discovered this land. Secondly, for 
that he chargeth him and others with blas- 
phemy, for calling Europe Christendom, or the 
Christian world. Thirdly, for that he did per- 
sonally apply to our present King Charles, these 
three places in the Revelations, viz." — The pas- 
sages themselves, unfortunately for the reader's 
curiosity, the Governor has failed to mention. 

This treatise, if it was ever published, has 
not been preserved ; and the only account, 
which has been given of it, let it be remem- 
bered, is that of the very magistrate by whom 
it was required for examination. But, taking 
even the version thus furnished, which, on the 
very best construction, is liable to savor, in 
6ome degree, at least, of an ex 'parte statement, 



32 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

the act of the General Court can be regarded 
as nothing less than a despotic exercise of ab- 
solute power. It demanded from the privacy 
of his own desk an unpublished manuscript, 
which he had written within another jurisdic- 
tion, on a great subject of abstract right and of 
natural law, and summoned him to appear and 
receive censure for the opinions it contained. 
Why these opinions should have been thus 
offensive to the fathers of Massachusetts, it is 
now by no means easy to determine. They 
did not essentially differ from the practice of 
the early colonists, who, in all cases, made some 
remuneration to the natives for the lands which 
they occupied ; nor were they at all at variance 
with the original instructions given by the British 
cabinet to Endicott and the settlers at Salem. 
The language of these instructions was, " If any 
of the salvages pretend right of inheritance to 
all, or any part of the lands granted in our 
patent, we pray you endeavor to purchase their 
tytle, that we may avoid the least scruple of in- 
trusion." * The great principle of natural right 
on which those practices and instructions were 
founded, had presented itself with surprising 
clearness to the mind of Roger Williams, and 
he fearlessly accepted the conclusions to which 

* Bancroft, Vol. 1. p. 346. 



R O G E R W I L L I A M S . 33 

It conducted him. So strongly had they taken 
possession of his mind, that he addressed a let- 
ter to the King himself, as he says, '' not with- 
out the approbation of some of the chiefs of 
New England, then tender also upon this point 
before God," '' humbly acknowledging the evil 
of that part of the patent, which respects the 
donation of land."* 

Had these opinions proceeded from a different 
source, or been advocated with less clearness 
and boldness, it is probable they might have 
given less offence to the magistrates, and oc- 
casioned their author far less trouble. But, 
coming from one who was already an object 
of suspicion, and calling in question, as they 
plainly did, the principle of the King's patents, 
they seemed, both to the Court and the clergy, 
to be the expressions alike of heresy and sedi- 
tion. It was, undoubtedly, on this account, that 
the Court, who in this, as in other instances, 
extended their jurisdiction over the opinions as 
well as the actions of the people, thus arbitra- 
rily summoned him to appear before them and 
receive censure. 

The conduct of Mr. Williams, under this 
harassing treatment of the authorities, was such 
as reflects the highest honor both upon the 

* Reply to Mr. Cotton, p. 277 
VOL. IV. 3 



34 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

firmness and clearness of his understanding, and 
upon the feelings of his heart. He complied 
with the orders of the Court, odious and offen- 
sive to his sense of right as they must have 
been, and vv^rote letters to the magistrates, al- 
leging that his treatise had been written " only 
for the private satisfaction of the Governor of 
Plymouth ; " and, with expressions of penitence, 
if he had committed any wrong, and of loyalty 
to the King, though without renouncing his 
opinions, he submissively offered the manuscript 
to be burned. He has often been charged with 
obstinacy and troublesome pertinacity ; but, in 
this case, for once at least, he displayed a 
spirit entirely the reverse, and which seems to 
have surprised and subdued even his bitterest 
persecutors ; for, says the historian, " they found 
the matters not to be so evil as at first they 
seemed." Thus were his firm adherence to the 
principles of justice, and the clear convictions 
of his reason, mellowed with the mild spirit of 
Christian forbearance ; and thus, even amidst 
oppression and outrage, did he manifest that 
sublime charity which thinketh no evil, which 
suffereth long, and is kind. 

It is not essential to the ends of this me- 
moir to attempt even a sketch of any of the 
numerous public disputes that so often and so 
deeply agitated that age of controversy. Their 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 35 

history is a melancholy record of the struggles, 
and bigotr}', and strife, through which our New 
England society was made to pass, before it 
emerged into the universal tolerance, the quiet 
repose, the friendly association, of the different 
forms of religious faith, which now characterize 
our happy communities. With but few of these 
was Roger Williams, in any manner, particu- 
larly connected. During his second residence 
at Salem, he is said to have preached to his 
congregation upon the duty of women to wear 
veils in all public assemblies, a question which 
appears to have been quite seriously discussed 
among the ministers of the colony. The doc- 
trine was controverted by Mr. Cotton, who, 
happening to preach at Salem while the ques- 
tion was occupying public attention, showed, to 
the satisfaction of his hearers, that the custom 
" had no sufficient foundation in Scripture." 
The introduction of such topics into the pulpit 
was by no means confined to Roger Williams ; 
for, in those days, the minister was in the habit 
of discussing, in his sermons, every topic of 
legislation and of manners, as well as of mor- 
als and religion. John Eliot, the noble-minded 
apostle to the Indians, and President Chaun- 
cy, the head of Harvard College, preached 
earnest and learned discourses on the practice 
of wearing wigs ; and, in 1649, the whole body 



36 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

of the magistrates, with Endicott at their head; 
signed a solemn protest against the custom of 
men's wearing long hair, and requested the clergy 
to preach against it, '' as a thing uncivil and 
unmanly, whereby men do deform themselves, 
and offend sober and modest men, and do cor- 
rupt good manners."* 

In another of the ephemeral controversies of 
the day, Mr. Williams appears to have taken a 
larger share. The military ensign then estab- 
lished as the colors of the several regiments of 
the English army, contained, among its devices, 
the sign of the cross. Williams delivered a 
discourse on the unlawfulness of all ceremonies 
and symbols, which had been borrowed from 
the service of idolatry, or of Popery, on the 
ground that their use tended to lead men back 
to superstition and false religion. In accord- 
ance with this doctrine, which, indeed, was one 
of the favorite principles of the Puritans, Mr. 
Endicott, one of the magistrates of Salem, or- 
dered the cross to be cut out of the colors ; an 
act which, in some of its features, bore the 
appearance of treason against the King, and 
which, for a time, was productive of no little 
strife among the disputatious colonists of the 
Bay. The matter was referred to the Governor 

* Hutchinson's Hist, of Mass. Vol. 1. p. 143. 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 37 

and the General Court, and stirred deeply 
the fountains of public sentiment, and was at 
length settled only by a species of compromise, 
by leaving the odious symbol out of the colors 
of the companies in the colony, and retaining 
it in the flag of the castle, and in those of the 
shipping in the harbor. 

The incidents narrated above occurred during 
the period in which Mr. Williams had been 
performing the duties of a minister in Salem, 
in the capacity of assistant to the pastor of the 
church. By the assiduity and faithfulness with 
which he had discharged these duties, and the 
character he had ever maintained in the com- 
munity, he won for his ministry the respect of 
the people, and attained to high standing and 
influence, both as a clergyman and a citizen. 
Accordingly, on the death of Mr. Skelton, he 
was invited by the church to become their 
teacher. Against this invitation, as against that 
which had been given him on a former occa- 
sion, the Court sent their decided remonstrance, 
and requested the church at Salem not to 
ordain him. The church, however, with a be- 
coming independence, disregarded the remon- 
strance, and Mr. Williams was regularly insti- 
tuted in the pastoral office in August, 1634. 
This act was regarded by the Court as a high 
handed contemnt of their authority, which was 



38 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

not soon forgiven, and, as a subsequent chap- 
ter will show, was at length punished in a most 
remarkable and characteristic manner. 



CHAPTER V. 

His Doctrine of the Freedom of Conscience, — 
The Difficulty in tvhich it involves him with 
the Clergy and Magistrates. — His Opposition 
to the Freeman'' s Oath. — The Persecution of 
the Magistrates extends to the People of Sa- 
lem. — He is deserted by his Church. — The 
Judgment of the Clergy. — The Decree of 
Banishment. — He leaves Salem. 

From the period of Mr. Williams's final set- 
tlement as the teacher of the church in Salem, 
may be dated the beginning of the controversy 
with the clergy and Court of Massachusetts, 
which, at length, terminated in his banishment 
from the colony. He was surrounded by men, 
both in ecclesiastical and civil life, whose minds 
were, as yet, incapable of forming a concep- 
tion of the great principle of spiritual freedom, 
which had taken full possession of his soul, 
and which was now gradually moulding all his 
opinions, and, by unseen agenciss, shaping the 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 39 

destiny, which the future had in store for him 
He beheved that no human power had the 
right to intermeddle in matters of conscience ; 
and that neither church nor state, neither bish- 
op nor priest nor King, may prescribe the 
smallest iota of religious faith. For this, he 
maintained, a man is responsible to God alone. 
This principle, now so familiar and well-es- 
tablished, was, in all its applications, entirely at 
variance with the whole structure of society in 
the colony of Massachusetts ; and every new as- 
sertion of it on the part of Mr. Williams, or 
of any of the doctrines which he had connected 
with it, was sure to lead him into new collision 
with the authorities. Hence it was, that every 
expression of his opinions seemed to be heresy, 
and almost every act of his life a protest 
against the legislation and the customs of the 
people among whom he lived. His preaching 
was faithful, his doctrines on all the great essen- 
tials of Christian faith were sound, and his life 
was of blameless purity. Yet he was fast falling 
beneath the ban both of civil and ecclesiastical 
proscription. His own church had expressed 
their confidence in his character ; but beyond 
his fellow-citizens of Salem, there was none 
that extended to him the hand of fellowship, 
or expressed the slightest sympathy with the 
great truths that were struggling in his mind. 



40 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY 

The occurrences, which have already been 
related, had undoubtedly confirmed the preju- 
dices of the magistrates, and exerted an impor- 
tant influence in hastening on the severe pro- 
ceedings, which were finally adopted against 
him. It has also been said that these occur- 
rences were deemed more flagrant and dan- 
gerous in consequence of a feeling of jealousy, 
which existed at that time between Boston and 
Salem. Boston was the residence of the Gov- 
ernor and of most of the Council. It was also 
the capital of the colony, and the centre of 
both civil and religious influence and authority. 
It would not be strange, therefore, if the views 
of a minister of Salem should be regarded with 
suspicion more readily than would have been 
the case with a minister of Boston. The repu- 
tation of Mr. Williams among his own townsmen 
was of high order and of unsullied purity. He 
had brought with him to Salem some of the in- 
habitants of Plymouth, who were attached to his 
ministry, and it may have been feared that, in 
connection with other causes, his resolute spirit 
and popular talents would give an importance 
to the town that might eclipse the metropolis. 

However this may have been, but few ses- 
sions of the Court were held, during his second 
residence in Salem, at which he was not sum- 
moned to appear, or at which his opinions or 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 41 

conduct were not, in some manner, the subject 
of complaint and reprobation. A few months 
after his settlement as pastor of the church, 
we find him again obnoxious to the Court for 
having publicly called in question the King's pat- 
ent, and also " for usual terming the churches 
of England antichristian." Again, in the fol- 
lowing April, 1635, the Governor and assistants 
summoned him to appear at Boston. " The oc- 
casion was," as appears from the Journal of 
Governor Winthrop, " that he had taught publicly 
that a magistrate ought not to tender an oath 
to an un regenerate man, for that we thereby 
have communion with a wicked man in the 
worship of God, and cause him to take the 
name of God in vain. He was heard before 
all the ministers, and very clearly confuted." 
So says the Governor. Had Mr. Williams given 
a version of the argument, the result might 
have been stated differently. 

The opinion of Mr. Williams, here referred 
to, seems to have been called forth on the oc- 
casion of the Court's enacting what is known 
by the name of the " Freeman's Oath." This 
oath was appointed from an apprehension of 
" Episcopal and malignant practices against the 
country," in order to test the fidelity of the 
people of the colony. It in reality changed the 
obligations of allegiance from the government of 



42 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

King Charles to the government of Massachusetts, 
and, by an order of the Court, was imposed upon 
every man of sixteen years of age and upwards, 
upon the penalty of his being punished, in case 
of refusing to take it, at the discretion of the 
Court. Williams opposed the oath, as contrary 
to the charter, and as inconsistent with the 
duty of British subjects ; and, in the course of 
his opposition, he developed his singular views 
of the nature of an oath. His great principle 
of the liberty of conscience led him to . doubt 
the right of the colony to impose an oath; and 
his opposition was so determined, that " the 
government was forced to desist from that pro- 
ceeding." 

His opinions upon this subject appear to 
have been maintained by a train of reason- 
ing peculiar to himself; and, though unfolded 
somewhat at length in some of his subsequent 
writings, they are yet by no means easy of full 
comprehension. He seems to have regarded an 
oath as in some sense an act of worship, which 
was to be entered upon only on the most se- 
rious occasions, and with devout feelings, and 
which, like any other act of worship, the civil 
magistrate had no right to enforce against the 
consent of the individual. His opinions, it would 
appear, were formed while living in England; 
it may be, from an observation of the light 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 43 

manner in which oaths were administered, and 
of the offensive formahty of kissing the Bible, 
which was usually connected with their admin- 
istration. In his reply to George Fox, he de- 
clares, that he has submitted to the loss of 
large sums in the courts of England, rather 
than yield to these formalities, though he did 
not object to taking the oath without them; 
which the judges, he says, were unwilling to ad- 
mit, without an act of Parliament. 

The controversy with the authorities of Mas- 
sachusetts, in which the principles of Williams 
had impelled him to engage, was now becoming 
every day more violent, and running into almost 
every act of the Court, and every relation of 
social life. They still maintained a connection 
with the Church of England, and manifested a 
respect for its institutions. Williams retained a 
vivid recollection of its intolerant acts, and boldly 
declared its " bloody tenet of persecution," as 
he termed it, to be ^'most lamentably contrary 
to the doctrine of Jesus Christ." The magis- 
trates enacted a law, requiring every man to at- 
tend public worship, and to contribute to its 
support. This he denounced as an open viola- 
tion of natural rights, and the prolific source of 
every form of persecution. " No one," said he, 
" should be bound to maintain a worship against 
his own consent." The ablest divines were ap- 



44 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

pointed to reason with him, and to confute the 
heresies that seemed wrought into his very be- 
ing. But it was all in vain. His opinions were 
misrepresented, and carried out to absurd and 
unauthorized conclusions, and these were charged 
upon him as essential parts of his doctrine ; but 
he contented himself simply with denying what 
he did not believe, and reiterating, with irre- 
pressible boldness, the faith which he held. This 
faith set a clear and well-defined limit to the 
exercise of the civil power. "It extends," said 
he, with singular accuracy and clearness of per- 
ception, " only to the bodies, and goods, and out- 
ward estates of men ;" with conscience and with 
religious opinions " the civil magistrate may not 
intermeddle, even to stop a church from apostasy 
and heresy." These were the opinions that in- 
flamed the whole body of the divines, and called 
down upon his head the sternest censures from 
both the civil and ecclesiastical heads of the 
colony. 

While affairs were in this condition, the peo- 
ple of Salem preferred to the Court a claim for 
a tract of land lying in Marblehead Neck ; but 
the Court, as a punishment for the contempt of 
authority the town had shown in settling Mr 
Williams, refused to allow the claim. The reason 
of the refusal was imbodied in the decision it- 
self. This reckless mingling together of mat- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 45 

ters entirely separate and independent, Williams 
taught his church strongly to resent, as an act 
of flagrant injustice. In conjunction with the 
church, he wrote "letters of admonition unto 
aH the churches, whereof any of the magistrates 
were members, that they might admonish the 
magistrates of their injustice." * This course, in 
our times, would be called appealing to the peo- 
ple ; for the members of the churches alone 
were freemen of the colony, and in the absence 
of that great redresser of wrongs, the public 
presSjf it was the only mode in which the gen- 
eral sense of justice could be effectually ad- 
dressed. But the democratic principle was then 
in its infancy, and the right of instruction to 
the deputies of the people, now so frequently 
exercised, was at that time but imperfectly un- 
derstood. The Court, therefore, were not to be 
diverted by any apprehension of popular disap- 
probation. The act of Williams and his church, 
in thus presuming to appeal from the decision 
of the magistrates to the tribunal of public sen- 
timent, seemed to them Httle less than open 
rebellion ; and at the next meeting of the Court, 



* Master John Cotton's Reply to Roger JFilliams. 

f The first newspaper in the American colonics was 
commenced at Boston, in 1704. It was called "Tiie Bos- 
ton News-Letter." 



46 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

the deputies of Salem were deprived of their 
seats until the letter had been satisfactorily ex- 
plained, and ample apology had been made for 
their participation in its authorship and doc- 
trines. 

The town of Salem submitted to the dis- 
franchisement, and its deputies made the apology 
which was demanded, though not till after Mr. 
Endicott, the principal deputy, had suffered im- 
prisonment for his adherence to the doctrines of 
the letter. Williams, at this juncture, addressed 
another letter to his church, urging them to re- 
nounce all communion with the other churches 
of the colony ; but they had been humbled by 
the magistrates, and refused any longer to second 
the views of their teacher. 

When, on a former occasion, in his treatise 
concerning the patent, he had been charged by 
the Court with disowning his allegiance to the 
King, he had explained his views, and had given 
his book to the Governor to be burned. But 
now his principles and his conduct required no 
explanation, and by him, at least, they were not 
to be retracted. They were the deepest-seated 
principles of his moral nature, and could be sur- 
rendered only with existence itself. Alone in 
his maintenance of them, when his townsmen 
and his church had all yielded to the mandate 
of power, and deserted him ; when even his wife. 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 47 

It may be fearing the consequences that were 
already threatening her family, added her en- 
treaties, and even her reproaches, to swell the 
tide that was setting against him ; he stands 
Doldly forth, the sublimest moral object of the 
time, and calmly waits the storm that is fiercely 
driving towards him. The ministers, with Mr. 
Cotton and Mr. Hooker at their head, sent a 
committee to Salem, to deal with him, and cen- 
sure him ; but he disowned their spiritual juris- 
diction, and declared himself " ready to be bound, 
and banished, and even to die in New Eng- 
land," rather than renounce the clear convic- 
tions, which had been fastened more firmly upon 
his understanding by the persecutions he had 
sufl'ered. He felt that a great principle was 
committed to him to maintain and defend ; that 
'• the removal of the yoke of soul-oppression " 
was worthy to task his best energies, and to call 
forth the costliest sacrifices. He plainly de- 
lighted himself with anticipating the results of 
the spiritual freedom /or which he was contend- 
ing, and pictured to his imagination the bless- 
ings that would follow in its train ; and he 
bound himself to the conclusion, expressed in 
his own strong language, that, " as it will prove 
an act of mercy and righteousness to the en 
slaved nations, so it is of binding force to en 
gage the whole and every interest and con 



48 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

science to preserve the common liberty and 
peace." 

The controversy having arrived at a crisis like 
this, the ministers, at the request of the court, 
assembled to consider his case, and to give their 
advice to the magistrates. They " professedly 
declared " that he deserved to be banished from 
the colony for maintaining the doctrine " that 
the civil magistrate might not intermeddle even 
to stop a church from apostasy and heresy," 
and that the churches ought to request the magis- 
trates to remove him. Thus was the opinion 
of the ecclesiastical authorities plainly and fully 
declared, and the sentence of the civil powder 
was not long delayed. 

In July, he was summoned to Boston, to an- 
swer to the charges brought against him at the 
General Court, which w^as then in session. He 
was here, before the highest tribunal of the col- 
ony, solemnly charged with the crime of main- 
taining the following dangerous opinions. First, 
That the magistrate ought not to punish the 
breach of the first table, otherwise than in such 
cases as did disturb the civil peace. Secondly, 
That he ought not to tender an oath to an un- 
regenerate man. Thirdly, That he ought not to 
pray with such, though wife, child, &c. Fourthly, 
That a man ought not to give thanks after sac- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 49 

lament, nor after meat." * These several charges 
may have represented his opinions very imper- 
fectly ; but even supposing them to be perfectly 
accurate expressions of the views which he really 
entertained, they yet seem strange matters for 
the action of a civil tribunal of legislators and 
magistrates. 

In the trial of Roger Williams, if trial it may 
be called, there appears to have been no ex- 
amination of witnesses, and no hearing of coun- 
sel. In all the colony, there were none to raise 
a question of jurisdiction, save alone the indi- 
vidual accused ; and in raising this question his 
very crime consisted. The charges were the sub- 
ject of long and serious debate, which terminated 
in allowing him and the church in Salem " time 
to consider these things till the next General 
Court, and then, either to give satisfaction, or to 
expect the sentence." The interval, we may 
readily imagine, was a period of no common 
excitement among the churches and towns of 
Massachusetts Bay. The contest was one that 
could not fail to awaken the deepest interest 
among men entertaining views of government 
and religion like those prevalent among the early 
Puritans. On one side was arrayed the whole 
power of the civil government, supported by the 

* Winthrop's Journal, Vol. I. p. 162. 
VOL. IV. 4 



50 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

united voice of the clergy, and by the general 
sentiment of the people ; on the other was a 
single individual, a minister of the gospel, of dis- 
tinguished talents and of blameless life, vi^ho yet 
had ventured to assert the freedom of conscience, 
and to deny the jurisdiction of any human author- 
ity in controlling its dictates or decisions. The 
purity of the churches, and the cause of sound 
doctrine, were thought to be in peril, and all 
waited with eager expectation to know the issue 
of this first schism that had sprung up among 
the Pilgrim bands of New England. 

The next General Court was held in October, 
1635. Mr. Williams was again summoned be- 
fore the Court, and appeared for the last time. 
His opinions had not changed. He had been 
deserted by most of those, who at first had made 
common cause with him ; but he still stood firm, 
the undaunted champion of the principles which 
he had espoused. The Court themselves were 
as little inclined to abandon the ground they 
had taken. Instructed by the advice they had 
received from the ministers, they decided, though 
not by a large majority of the members, that he 
should depart out of their jurisdiction within six 
weeks. 

The following is the act of banishment, as it 
stands upon the colony records. " Whereas, 
Mr. Roger Williams, one of the elders of the 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 51 

church of Salem, hath broached and divulged 
divers new and dangerous opinions against the 
authority of magistrates ; as also writ letters of 
defamation, both of the magistrates and churches 
here, and that before any conviction, and yet 
maintaineth the same without any retractation ; it 
is therefore ordered, that the said Mr. Williams 
shall depart out of this jurisdiction within six 
weeks now next ensuing, which if he neglect 
to perform, it shall be lawful for the Governor 
and two of the magistrates to send him to some 
place out of this jurisdiction, not to return any 
more without license from the Court." 

The records also contain the following decree, 
which was passed at the same Court, and which 
serves to illustrate the inquisitorial spirit of the 
tribunal, which banished Roger Williams, and 
which, in so many other instances, asserted its 
jurisdiction over the thoughts and the opinions 
of men. " Mr. Samuel Sharpe is enjoined to 
appear at the next particular Court, to answer 
for the letter, that came from the church of Sa- 
lem, as also to bring the names of those that 
will justify the same, or else to acknowledge his 
offence under his own hand, for his own par- 
ticular." * 

The sentence of banishment was passed ol 

* Savage's Winthrop, Vol. I. p. 167, note, 



52 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

the 3d of November ; all the ministers, save one, 
approving it. Though it must have been an- 
ticipated, and perhaps even hoped for, yet its 
final passage was productive of no small re- 
action and excitement among the more quiet 
citizens and the sober-minded laymen of the col- 
ony. Especially in Salem, it is said, the whole 
community was in an uproar. The time was 
soon after extended so as to allow him to re- 
main till spring. But his presence was soon 
found to endanger too much the orthodoxy ol 
the people. It was complained to the Court, 
that he still persisted in maintaining and utter- 
ing his opinions ; that many of the people, " ta- 
ken with an apprehension of his godliness," re- 
sorted to his house to listen to his teachings, 
and that he was preparing to withdraw with' 
them from Massachusetts, and form a settlement 
upon Narragansett Bay. 

The neighborhood of a new colony, thus 
founded upon the principles of Roger Williams, 
was the subject of no very agreeable anticipa- 
tion to the fathers of Massachusetts; and upon 
receiving the information, they determined to 
send him to England, by a ship tlr^en lying in 
the harbor ready for sea. 

For this purpose, he received another sum 
mons to attend the Court at Boston. It was 
now winter. His health was impaired by the 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 53 

jabors he had endured, and the excitements 
through which he had passed. Injustice and 
oppression, the desertion of his friends, and the 
hard speeches of his enemies, had wounded his 
spirit, though they had not imbittered the feel- 
ings of his heart. He sent an answer, refusing 
to obey the summons of the Court, which was 
borne to Boston by " divers of the people of 
Salem," alleging, at the same time, as a reason 
of his refusal, the ill health from which he was 
suffering. 

But the magistrates were not thus to be de- 
feated. They sent a small sloop, or pinnace, 
to Salem, with a warrant to Captain Underbill 
to apprehend him, and carry him on board the 
ship, which was to sail immediately for Eng- 
land. When, however, the officers went to his 
house, they found his wife and children, but 
he had already gone three days before. 

Had the warrant of the magistrates found 
him still in Salem, the name of Roger Wil- 
liams would have been linked with far other 
scenes and achievements than those with which 
it is now forever associated. He would have 
been transported back to England, and, in- 
^ stead of becoming the founder of a state in 
the American confederacy, and passing his life 
in the comparative obscurity of a New England 
settlement, he might have vindicated the cause 



54 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

of freedom in the British Parhament, and be 
come a sharer in the triumphs and defeats 
through which it passed in that age of revolu- 
tion and crime ; in England, as in America, he 
would still have asserted the same great princi- 
ples j and history might have blazoned his bril- 
liant deeds, and recorded his name with those 
of Hampden, and Milton, and Sir Henry Vane, 
his friends and illustrious compeers in the same 
noble cause. 



CHAPTER VI. 

His Wanderings after his Banishment. — He vis- 
its Massasoit, and begins a Settlement at See- 
JconJc. — He crosses the River, and lays the 
Foundations of Providence. 

It was in circumstances like these, that the 
founder of Rhode Island was compelled to 
leave the colony, to which he had fled to es- 
cape the yoke of ecclesiastical tyranny in Eng- 
land. It was like a second exile, rendered the 
more difliicult to be borne, because of the hands 
by which it was forced upon him, and the 
wintry solitude into which it drove him forth 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 56 

The approbation which the ministers gave to 
the act by which he was banished, was much 
more nearly unanimous than the vote of the 
magistrates by which it had been passed. In- 
deed, the whole proceeding had its origin in a 
mistaken, though, doubtless, sincere regard for 
the interests of religion. Though the language^' 
of the sentence charges him with defamation 
of '.he magistrates, yet it was only in denying 
their jurisdiction in matters of conscience, and 
in condemning their unjust proceedings, that 
this defamation consisted. It was not pretend- 
ed that he had violated any law, that he had 
been guilty of any immoral act, or even that 
he had proved faithless to any trust, either as 
a minister or a citizen ; his opinions were his 
only crimes, and for these, and these alone, 
did the Court of Massachusetts decide to send 
him from their jurisdiction. 

From the narrative which has already been 
given, it is plain that the head and front of his 
offending consisted in his maintaining, that the 
civil magistrate has no right to interfere with 
religious opinions. Of the truth of this princi- 
ple, and of its paramount importance to the 
well-being of society, there is no longer any 
room for question. It is now the cherished 
sentiment of the people of this country, and is 
rapidly extending its sway throughout the Prot- 



56 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

estant world. In the mind of Roger Williams, 
even at an early period of life, it was clearly 
conceived, and earnestly pressed to its legit- 
imate results ; though it was there mingled with 
other opinions, with which it had no natural 
connection. It may also be admitted, that, while 
in Massachusetts, he advocated his principle 
with too urgent a zeal, and with too little re- 
gard for the prevailing opinions of the age ; 
but, after making every allowance that either 
justice or charity can claim, his banishment 
must still be regarded as an arbitrary proceed- 
ing, utterly without foundation either in jus- 
tice or in state necessity. It was the offspring 
of a principle that would justify every species 
of tyranny, and it will forever remain among 
the few spots that tarnish the escutcheon of 
Massachusetts, otherwise radiant with unnum- 
bered virtues. 

At the period to which this narrative relates, 
how different was the aspect of New England 
from that which she now presents 1 From 
the shores of Massachusetts Bay to the shores 
of the Narragansett, is now a pleasant excur- 
sion of a few hours, through busy villages and 
cultivated fields, and across a region diversified 
everywhere with the innumerable occupation? 
and the ever-cheerful sights and sounds of civ 
Uized life. But, at the time of Roger Wil- 



R G E R W I L L I A M S . 57 

liams's banishment, none of these had even begun 
to be. The only settlements of white men, in 
the district now comprising the states of Mas- 
sachusetts, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire, 
were scattered along the coast from Cape Cod 
to Portsmouth. The colonists, in that early day, 
liad seldom travelled far into the interior. The 
whole extent of country stretching northward 
from the ocean, between Boston or Plymouth on 
the east, and the Pawtucket or Seekonk River on 
the west, now embracing several thickly-peopled 
counties of the state of Massachusetts, was then 
a wide wilderness, interspersed with thick for- 
ests, and presenting scarcely a single dwelling 
of civilized man. 

It was in January, 1636, the sternest month 
of a New England winter, when Roger Wil- 
liams left his wife and babes in Salem, in order 
to escape the warrant, that would have con- 
ducted him to the ship then waiting to bear him 
to England. He went forth an exiled maa, to 
trust his hfe and fortunes to the rough chances 
of the wilderness, that then skirted the colonies 
of Plymouth and of Massachusetts Bay. Seldom 
has an exile for opinion's sake been driven 
from a Christian community to encounter more 
severe necessities, or endure more crushing pri- 
vations. He was without companions, and with- 
out a place of refuge from the severities of the 



58 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

pitiless season. Though he has left no detailed 
account of his wanderings, yet here and there 
a scattered allusion, in his writings, tells us how 
wretched must have been his exiled condition. 
In a letter to his friend Major Mason, written 
thirty-five years afterwards, he speaks of still 
feeUng its effects. "I was sorely tossed," says 
he, "for fourteen weeks, in a bitter winter sea- 
son, not knowing what bread or bed did 
mean." * 

In the absence of authentic narrative, the 
imagination calls up the desolate aspect of 
New England two hundred years ago, and pic- 
tures the scene of his " sorrowful flight." Be- 
fore him spread the wide forest, covered with 
the deep snows of midwinter, tracked by wild 
beasts, whose numbers and ferocity civilization 
had not yet diminished, and diversified only by 
occasional groups of the inhospitable dwellings 
of the Indians. Behind him were his family 
and his home, in the settlements from which he 
had been banished for conscience' sake. Pro- 
vided only with the poorest means of subsist- 
ence, separated from the commonest charities 

* Upon this period in the life of the father of Rhode 
Island, one of the gifted sons of that state has founded 
the epic narrative of " What Cheer, or Roger Williams in 
Banishment^'' an historical poem of unusual fidelity to his- 
tory, and containing passages of great beauty and pathos. 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 59 

of civilized life, how heavily must those dreary 
weeks have rolled away ! The winter's storm 
roars in the forest, the howl of the wolf and 
the scream of the panther are borne upon the 
blast; but his only shelter is a hollow tree, or 
the comfortless cabins of the savages. Y^t this 
outcast man, whom rulers had banished, whom 
churches and clergy had proscribed, bears with 
him, in his desert wanderings, a great doctrine 
of Christian ethics, an eternal principle of civil 
right, of inestimable importance to all mankind. 
He alone comprehends it in its true signifi- 
cance ; and, as an apostle commissioned from 
Heaven, he alone has preached it to a blind 
and bigoted age. If he perishes amidst the 
fury of the storm, or from the rage of wild 
beasts, or of savage men, there is not another 
in New England, perhaps not in Christendom, 
who fully comprehends it, and dares assert it. 

But he was not destined thus to perish. In 
the days of his prosperity, he had assiduously 
cultivated the friendship of the Indians, who 
visited the settlements of the colonists. He had 
thus acquired the use of their language, and 
now, in his time of need, when he presented 
himself at their squahd cabins, a houseless wan- 
derer, they received him to their rude hospital- 
ity. " These ravens," says he, '• fed me in the 
w^ilderness." And, in /after life, he ever ac 



60 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

knowledged, with pious gratitude, the Provi- 
dence that watched over hirn, and protected 
him amidst the sufferings and perils through 
which he passed. 

Of the incidents that befell him in his soli- 
tary wanderings, after leaving Salem, a few 
words will suffice to tell all that can be gleaned 
from his writings ; and this is to be gathered 
rather from incidental allusions than from any 
narrative he has left. These are found mainly 
in the letter to Major Mason, to which refer- 
ence has already been made. It bears date at 
Providence, June 22d, 1670, and makes men- 
tion of the following interesting fact, that serves 
to show how the spirit of humanity, at least in 
some of the Massachusetts magistrates, struggled 
with the perverted sense of duty, which dic- 
tated his banishment. At the time of his leav- 
ing Salem, Governor Winthrop, who, the year 
before, had been supplanted in the chief magis- 
tracy of the colony by Thomas Dudley,* wrote 
to Williams " to steer his course to the Narra- 
gansett Bay and Indians," as a region as yet 
unappropriated by any of the patents of the 
King. " I took," says he, " his prudent motion 
as a hint and voice from God ; and, waiving all 



* Mr. Haynes, the successor of Dudley, was Governor 
wlien Williams was banished. 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 61 

other thoughts and motions, I steered my course 
from Salem, (though in winter snow, which I 
feel yet,) unto these parts, wherein I may say, 
Feniel ; I have seen the face of God." 

It would appear that, when he fled from Sa- 
lem, he made his way through the forest to 
the lodges of the Pokanokets, who occupied the 
country north from Mount Hope as far as 
Charles River. Ousemaguin, or Massasoit, the 
famous chief of this tribe, had known Mr. Wil- 
liams when he lived in Plymouth, and had often 
received presents and tokens of kindness at his 
hands ; and now, in the days of his friendless 
exile, the aged chief welcomed him to his cabin 
at Mount Hope, and extended to him the pro- 
tection and aid he required. He granted to 
him a tract of land on the Seekonk River, to 
which, at the opening of spring, he repaired, 
and where " he pitched and began to build and 
plant." * At this place, also, at the same time, 
he was joined by a number of his friends from 
Salem. Here he doubtless thought his wander- 
ings were ended, and, with the friends who had 
come to share his exile, he hoped to plant ? 
settlement that should be free forever from 

* The spot, which was selected as the site of the new 
settlement, is near the beautiful bend in the river, now 
known as "Manton's Cove," a short distance above the 
upper bridge, directly eastward of Providence. 



62 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

" the yoke of soul-oppression," which the author- 
ities of Massachusetts Bay had sought to fasten 
on their necks. 

But scarcely had the first dwelling been 
raised in the new settlement, scarcely had the 
corn, which they had planted, appeared above 
the ground, when he was again disturbed, and 
obliged to move still further from Christian 
neighbors and the dwellings of civilized men 
" I received a letter," says he, " from my ancient 
friend, Mr. Winslow, then Governor of Plymouth, 
professing his own and others' love and respect 
for me, yet lovingly advising me, since I was 
fallen into the edge of their bounds, and they 
were loth to displease the Bay, to remove but 
to the other side pf the water; and then, he- said, 
I had the country before me, and might be as 
free as themselves, and we should be loving 
neighbors together." * 

With the advice given him in this friendly 
manner, and apparently without any sinister de- 
sign, his experience had now taught him the 
wisdom to comply. He accordingly soon aban- 
doned the fields which he had planted, and the 
dwelling he had begun to build, and embarked 
in a canoe upon the Seekonk River, in quest of 
another spot, where, unmolested, he might rear 

* Letter to Mason. Mass. Hist. Coll. Vol. I. p. 275. 



R G E R W I L L I A M S . 63 

a home and plant a separate colony. There 
were five others, who, having joined him at 
Seekonk, bore him company in the excursion in 
which he thus went forth to become the founder 
of a city and a state. Tradition has handed 
down, among the sons of these earliest citizens 
of Rhode Island, the course and incidents of 
their singular voyage. As the little bark, thus 
freighted with the fortunes of a future state, was 
borne along on the waters of the Seekonk, Wil- 
liams was greeted by some Indians, from the 
heights that rise on the western banks of the 
stream, with the friendly salutation, ' What 
cheer, Netopl What cheer V and first came to land 
at the spot now called Slate Rock, in the rear 
of the mansion of His Excellency Governor 
Fenner.* 

After exchanging salutations with the Indians, 
and, as is probable, obtaining some additional in- 
formation concerning the country which stretched, 
in summer's beauty, before him, he again em- 
barked, and, coasting along the stream, passed 

* The adjacent estate still bears the name of " What- 
cheer." This land, Roger Williams says, he planted with 
his own hands ; and by him it was conveyed to James Ellis, 
who soon after sold it to Arthur Fenner, the first of tlie 
ancient and respected family to whom it has ever since 
belonged. J^etop means " friend." Williams's Key, p. 2. 



64 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

round the headlands, now known as Fox Point, 
and India Point, up the harbor, to the mouth 
of the Mooshausic River. Here he landed, and, 
upon the beautiful slope of the hill that ascends 
from the river, he descried the spring around 
which he commenced the first " plantations of 
Providence." 

It was in the latter part of June, 1636, as 
well as can be ascertained, that Roger Williams 
and his companions began the settlement at the 
mouth of the Mooshausic River. A little dis- 
tance north of what is now the centre of the 
city, the spring is still pointed out, which drew 
the attention of the humble voyagers from See- 
konk. Here, after so many wanderings, was the 
weary exile to find a home, and to lay the 
foundations of a city, which should be a per- 
petual memorial of pious gratitude to the super- 
intending Providence which had protected him 
and guided him to the spot. How changed is 
the scene in the lapse of two hundred years ! 
Art and Wealth have covered with their beau- 
tiful mansions the hill-side that rose in luxuriant 
verdure before him, and Learning has erected 
her halls upon its summit. The solitary place 
has become a thickly-peopled city, the abode of 
wealth and of elegance, and, instead of the deep 
silence of nature, that then reigned over the 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 65 

scene, there are now heard, over hill, and plain, 
and water, the hum of the spindle, the bustle 
of trade, and the cheerful murmurs of busy 
life. 



CHAPTER VII. 

The principal Indian Tribes of New England 

— Williams's Intercourse with them. — His Views 
of their Rights, and his Influence ivith them. 

— Freedom of the Colony at Providence. — Its 
Government limited to civil Things. — Cir- 
cumstances in which Williams is ])laced. 

Of the numerous Indian tribes that occupied 
the territory of New England at the period of 
its first settlement by the whites, the most im- 
portant were the Pokanokets, the Pequots, with 
their tributaries, the Mohegans, and the Narra- 
gansetts. The Pokanokets were scattered from 
Mount Hope, over the region now comprised in 
the counties of Bristol and Plymouth, in the 
state of Massachusetts. This tribe, like most of 
the others on the coast, had been greatly re- 
duced by the ravages of the pestilence, which, 
a short period before the arrival of the Eng- 
lish, had swept away such multitudes of the 

VOL. IV. 5 



66 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

aboriginal race. The Pequots and Mohegans 
possessed the greater part of the state of Con- 
necticut. They were the fiercest and most war- 
like of all the New England tribes, and in their 
intercourse with the English, they perpetually 
manifested their treacherous and hostile spirit. 
They were confident of their own strength, and 
embraced, with savage eagerness, every oppor- 
tunity which presented itself to avenge the en- 
croachments, which the strangers were gradually 
making upon their native domain. 

The Narragansetts held beneath their sway 
the greater part of what is now the state of 
Rhode Island, together with the islands of the 
bay, and a portion of Long Island. Though shy 
of the English, they were the most intelligent 
and civilized, the most generous and faithful, of 
all the New England Indians. They had culti- 
vated agriculture, and others of the simpler arts 
of life, and were also the manufacturers of nearly 
all the ivampumjjeag in use among the natives 
as money. They were a numerous and powerful 
tribe ; and, though they had gradually lost their 
savage relish for war, they still could muster 
from four tp five thousand fighting men from 
their own and the tributary tribes. 

The language of the several tribes of New 
England seems to have been essentially the 
same. Indeed, Roger Williams himself informs 



ROGER WILL I A3IS. 67 

US, that, with his knowledge of the Narragansett 
tongue, he '' had entered into the secrets of 
those countries w herever the English dwell, about 
two hundred miles, between the French and 
Dutch plantations ; " and he adds, that " with this 
help a man may converse with thousands of the 
Indians all over the country." It is probable, 
also, that the same language, though with the 
modifications of various dialects, extendqd among 
the tribes of New York, New Jersey, and Dela- 
w'are. This singular, and, as it has been rep- 
resented, exceedingly copious and versatile lan- 
guage has been made the subject of much curious 
inquiry among the philologists of our own and 
of other lands. The people who spoke it have 
long since vanished from the hills and forests of 
New England ; but the language itself has sur- 
vived them in the pious though humble labors 
of their benefactors. Specimens of its endless 
words and its unique structure are still to be 
found in the " Key," which Williams wrote, in 
the " Grammar " of John Eliot, and especially 
in the few scattered copies that remain of the 
Indian Bible, W'hich the noble-minded apostle 
toiled away the best years of his life in trans 
iating. 

With these several tribes, w^hose names and 
iocaUties we have thus incidentally mentioned, 
Mr. Williams, during the remainder of his life 



68 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

was thrown into frequent, and, in some instances, 
most intimate association. He was always their 
friend, the vindicator of their rights, the inter- 
preter of their treaties, and the pacificator of 
their quarrels. He thus acquired an influence 
over them far superior to that of any other per- 
son of his time. 

The spot at which he had landed, and where 
he began to plant the new settlement, was with- 
in the territory belonging to the Narragansetts. 
Canonicus, the aged chief of the tribe, and Mi- 
antonomo, his nephew, had visited the colonies 
of Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay, while Wil- 
liams resided there, and had learned to regard 
him, in virtue of his being a minister, as one 
of the sachems of the English. He had also 
taken special pains to conciliate their good-will 
and gain their confidence, and " spared no cost 
towards them, in tokens and presents to Ca- 
nonicus and all his, many years before he came 
to Narragansett in person." Indeed, there is 
reason to believe, that, at an early period after 
his arrival in New England, on finding himself 
so widely at variance with his Puritan brethren, 
he conceived the design of withdrawing from the 
colonies, and settling among the Indians, that he 
might labor as a missionary for their civilization 
and conversion to Christianity ; and for this pur- 
pose, as it would appear, he then had " several 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 69 

treaties " with the Narragansett sachems, and re 
ceived from them the promise of a tract of land 
within their jurisdiction. The design of removing 
thither he probably ceased to entertain some 
time before his banishment ; yet now, when he 
was driven into the territory of the friendly sa 
chems, he avails himself of the promise they had 
formerly made, and receives from them a grant 
of the land at Providence, on which he had 
settled with his companions. 

In all his dealings with the Indians, Mr. Wil- 
liams was governed by a strict regard to the 
rights, which, he had always contended, belonged 
to them as the sole proprietors of the soil. He 
justly conceived that it belonged to them alone 
to give away the lands, which they and their 
fathers had occupied for centuries. In accord- 
ance with this principle, the assertion of which 
had given so much offence in Massachusetts, 
he waits for no patent from the King to con- 
fer upon him, as a favor from his majesty, the 
territory he sought to possess, but goes directly 
to the great sachems of the country, and pur- 
chases of them a cleai; title to the lands "lying 
upor the two fresh rivers, called Mooshausic 
and Wanasquatucket." The sachems, also, in 
consideration of his many kindnesses and ser- 
vices to them, ceded to him, as a gratuity, all 
the land lying between the above-named rivers 



70 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

and the Pawtuxet. The terms of these grants 
are sufficiently general to give rise, in these 
days, to endless litigation ; and, at different pe- 
riods in the early history of the town, they were 
productive of no little uncertainty and dispute. 
It must be admitted that they reflect but little 
credit on the legal education, which the founder 
of Rhode Island is said to have pursued under 
the direction of Sir Edward Coke. 

Of the settlement at Providence Roger Wil- 
liams was the earliest projector, and the sole 
negotiator with the Indians. It was by his in- 
fluence, and at his expense, that the purchase 
was procured from Canonicus and Miantonomo, 
who partook largely of the shyness and jealousy 
of the English so common to their tribe. He 
says, " It was not thousands nor tens of thousands 
of money, that could have bought of them an 
English entrance into this bay." It was done by 
^' that language, acquaintance, and favor with the 
natives," which he had acquired, and which he 
knew so well how to use. He was, in every 
sense, the father of the infant colony. By great 
charge and travel, he secured the land on which 
it was planted, and established a loving and 
peaceable neighborhood with the sachems around, 
by presents and gratuities, of which he also sus- 
tained the. cost. In order to raise the funds 
needed for this purpose, and for removing his 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 71 

wife and family to the new settlement, he was 
obliged to mortgage his house and land in 
Salem. 

Unlike the Pilgrims, who had organized their 
commonwealth simply for securing liberty for 
their own faith and worship, Roger Williams, in 
framing the organization of the new colony, did 
not lose sight of the great principle of spiritual 
freedom, for which he had contended while in 
Massachusetts. This principle was as broad as 
humanity itself, and he did not fail to perceive 
its application to others, as readily and clear- 
ly as to himself. The persons who accompa- 
nied him from Seekonk, and the others who 
soon after joined him at Providence, came 
without any solicitation from him ; yet he re- 
ceived them with the utmost kindness. He 
prescribed to them no conditions of their ad- 
mission to the colony, and exercised over them 
no personal control, but freely shared with 
them all that the friendship of the Indians had 
given him to bestow. By the deeds of the 
sachems of Narragansett, the lands at Provi- 
dence were conveyed to him alone, and '• were 
his as much as any man's coat upon his back.*' 
He might have retained them as his own per- 
manent fee, and, like the founders of Pennsyl 
vania and Maryland, having secured them by a 
charter from the King, he might have contin- 



72 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

ued the unquestioned proprietary of the entire 
domain. He thus might have amassed wealth 
and dignities, and bequeathed them as a legacy 
to his children. 

Such, however, was not the pohcy whicli he 
adopted. He desired that the new settlement 
might be '• for a shelter for persons distressed 
for conscience," and he welcomed with an open 
hand all who came to him for refuge. He 
chose to found the infant commonwealth in the 
simple principles of pure democracy, and reserved 
to himself no more either of authority or of 
land than he freely distributed to his associates. 
Though, in procuring the land, he had proba- 
bly parted with the whole of his little property, 
he yet gave it all, as a free gift, to the persons 
who had united with him in forming the set- 
tlement. The town subsequently voted him the 
sum of thirty pounds, not as purchase money, 
or as compensation for his services and expen- 
ditures, but as "a loving gratuity," which, how- 
ever, was to be paid from the common fund ap- 
pointed to be created by the payment of thirty 
shillings by each person, who should subsequently 
be admitted a member of the colony. 

Thus was tlie first settlement within the ter- 
ritory of Rhode Island commenced, in the spirit 
of generous liberality and mutual confidence, 
and with the utmost degree of personal free- 



R O G E R W I L L I A 31 S . 73 

dom that can consist with the existence of civil 
society. The httle community thrived beneath 
the genial influence of unrestricted freedom ; 
it was gradually enlarged by emigrations from 
the neighboring colonies and from England ; 
for the ships that now covered the Bay of 
Massachusetts came crowded with emigrants to 
the new world. They bore to the shores of 
New England, not the modey throng of home- 
less and wretched beings, who now crowd the 
steerage of our packet ships, but mainly the in- 
telligent and the virtuous, who had been perse- 
cuted for conscience' sake, and who preferred 
a life of exile to the disabilities and privations 
to which they were subjected at home. Among 
them were often found persons of superior ed- 
ucation, and of large estates, mingled with the 
adventurous spirits, who sought in the distant 
colonies a freer range of action and opinion, and 
a wider sphere of enterprise. Many of these 
came to the plantations at Providence, where 
the opinions and conduct of individuals were the 
least subjected to the scrutiny of the public. 

The persons who thus joined the settlement 
of Roger Williams bound themselves to con- 
form to the principles on which it had been 
founded, and also to be governed by the orders 
and agreements of the majority. They were ad- 
mitted to the fellowship of the settlers by sub- 



74 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

scribing the following instrument, which stands 
without date in the earliest records of the col- 
ony, and was undoubtedly the first form of 
civil government which the inhabitants adopted. 

" We, whose names are here underwritten, 
being desirous to inhabit in the tow'n of Provi- 
dence, do promise to submit ourselves, in active 
or passive obedience, to all such orders or 
agreements as shall be made for public good 
of the body in an orderly way, by the major 
consent of the present inhabitants, masters of 
families, incorporated together into a township, 
and such others whom they shall admit into 
the same, only in civil things." 

This earliest form of the social compact, 
adopted by the settlers at Providence, is re- 
markable alike for its simplicity, and for the 
entire freedom it guaranties to each individual 
in every sphere of life, save in civil things alone. 
It embodies the principle for which Roger Wil- 
liams had contended ever since his arrival in 
America, and for the maintenance of which he 
had been persecuted by the Court of Massachu- 
setts, and, it is believed, is the first form of 
government recorded in history that contains 
an express practical recognition of the rights 
of conscience. This instrument was undoubt- 
edly written by the father of the colony him- 
self. It breathes his spirit, and bears the im- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 75 

press of his character. While it expressly limits 
the power of the body politic to the civil rela- 
tions of the people, it at the same time care- 
fully guards against any exaggerated notions or 
wild misapplications of personal freedom, by 
strictly binding every individual to obey the 
orders and agreements of the majority of the 
''masters of families." It was the perfection 
of civil freedom, without any alloy of licen- 
tiousness, while it left the conscience undis- 
turbed in its allegiance to God alone. The 
spirit, which was thus infused into the govern- 
ment and social organization of the colony, at 
the very beginning of its existence, has never 
ceased to characterize the legislation of Rhode 
Island ; and, to this day, its influence is still 
felt among the people. It is a prominent fact 
in her history, that her citizens have ever been 
distinguished for the vigilance with which they 
have watched over the rights of conscience ; 
and not a single act of religious intolerance has 
ever disgraced the statute-book of the state. 
While, it may be, in other things she Las 
learned salutary lessons from her sister states, in 
this respect, at least, they are largely indebted 
to the success of her experiment, and the in- 
fluence of her well-sustained example.* 



to AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

The government of the town remained in 
the hands of its citizens, and was administered 
in the simple forms of a pure democracy for a 
number of years. No mention is found, in the 
records, of any authority delegated to individuals 
by the body politic before the year 1640.* No 
officers were appointed, except a town treas- 
urei ; for none was needed, since every ques- 
tion affecting the public weal, whether of a 
legislative or a judicial character, could well be 
arbitrated in the assembly of the people. This 
feature in the organization of the new society 
was a novelty among the settlements of New 
England, and gave rise to the reproach, that 
the settlers at Providence were opposed to 
magistrates. But the fact was far otherwise. 
Amidst the simple forms and harmonious inter- 
ests of a newly-planted community, that claimed 
no jurisdiction in matters of opinion, the office 
of magistrate would have been little else than 
a needless sinecure. The " orders and agree- 
ments of the majority " determined the action 
of each individual, and it is not improbable 
that the personal influence of their leader often 
proved an efficient aid in allaying the bicker- 
ings and strifes, that sprang up among the cit- 
izens of the little commonwealth. The numer- 

* Staples's Jlnnals of Providence. 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 77 

ous declarations in his writings, pertaining to the 
subject, and the pubhc acts of his hfe, show that 
he fully understood the principles of civil gov- 
ernment, and clearly perceived the eternal dis- 
tinction that subsists between real freedom and 
the specious but worthless theories that arrogate 
its name. 

In this humble manner were laid the founda- 
tions of the settlement at Providence, and the 
earliest beginnings of the state of Rhode Island. 
But other and more pressing necessities, than 
that of providing for the well-being of the town, 
must also have claimed the attention of its found- 
er, even during the first months of its existence. 
He had been obliged to leave the fields he had 
planted at Seekonk, just as the corn was ap- 
pearing above the ground; and when he arrived 
at the mouth of the Mooshausic, it was already 
too late to raise a harvest from the lands he 
there purchased of the Indians. The crops he 
might have raised by the labors of husbandry 
were thus in a great measure cut off; and, oc- 
cupied as he must have been during the re- 
mainder of the season, he could have done but 
little towards providing for the wants of his 
family. A dwelhng was to be reared, and the 
comforts of civilized life were to be gathered, 
upon a spot till now never trodden by white 
men. The summer was already far advanced, 



78 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

and, as he looked forward to the approach of 
winter, he must have beheld, in the distance, 
the hungry forms of poverty and w^ant hastening 
towards his door. He was shut out from all 
intercourse with the towns of Massachusetts 
Bay, and must have depended, for the subsist- 
ence of his family, mainly upon his casual suc- 
cess in fishing, or upon the scanty supplies of 
the Indians. 

In the course of the^autumn, he was visited 
by Governor Winslow, of Plymouth, of whom he 
speaks as " a great and pious soul," aild who, 
as he gratefully acknowledges, " put a piece of 
gold into the hands of his wife for their sup- 
ply ; " an incident which, especially when taken 
in connection with his own touching allusion to 
it, shows how nearly he was e.^iosed to " neces- 
sity's sharp pinch." His straitened circumstances 
were doubtless rendered the more aggravated 
and difficult to be borne, by the consideration 
that they were brought about by the foolish and 
bigoted legislation of men, with whom he had 
made a common cause in coming to New Eng- 
land for conscience' sake, who themselves were 
exiles, and had tasted the bitter sorrows of a life 
in the wilderness. It would not have been 
strange, considering the weakness of our nature, 
had the treatment which he received from Mas- 
sachusetts Bay, and the severe privations that 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 79 

followed from it, embittered his spirit, and 
shrouded it in the sullen glooms of settled hos- 
tility to the magistrates and elders of that col- 
ony. But no such result was produced in the 
mind of Roger Williams. He harbored no feel- 
ings of revenge for the injuries he had received. 
He seems only to have pitied the weakness and 
regretted the delusion from which they sprang; 
and he employed the first opportunity, that was 
presented to him, in requiting the people, who 
had persecuted and banished him, with the am- 
plest benefits and the noblest self-sacrifices. 



CHAPTEPv Vni. 



The Pequot War, — The Services Williams ren- 
ders the Government of Massachusetts. — His 
Agency saves the Colonies from Destruction 
— His Letter to Governor Winthrop. — Issue 
of the War. — Manner in which his Services 
are regarded by Massachusetts. 

Seldom does the page of history glow with a 
brighter illustration of the spirit of forgiveness, 
and of Christian magnanimity, than is presented 
in the conduct of Roger Williams towards the 



so AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

authorities of Massachusetts, immediately after 
his banishment, and while the recollection of his 
wrongs was yet fresh in his mind. The cir- 
cumstances, as will appear from the narrative, 
were those of extreme peril ; and the founder of 
Providence was the only person, who could avert 
the calamities that threatened to overwhelm the 
English settlements in New England. Had he 
then been wanting in the noblest impulses of 
generosity and duty, the settlements of the early 
Pilgrims of Plymouth and Massachusetts might 
have been destroyed amidst the horrors of In- 
dian massacre and conflagration. 

The Pequot Indians, who, as we have already 
stated, had always proved treacherous and hostile 
to the English, now threatened a universal in- 
surrection, for the purpose of driving them for- 
ever from the lands they had acquired. In the 
summer of 1636, they attacked a party of tra- 
ders in a sloop, near Block Island, and mur- 
dered John Oldham, one of the company ; and, 
having buried the hatchet with all the neighbor- 
ing tribes, were endeavoring to unite them in a 
general league, for the entire extermination of 
the colonies. The frustration of their designs 
of savage vengeance, and the preservation of 
New England from the merciless atrocities of 
Indian war, were accomplished by Roger Wil- 
liams. Upon receiving intelligence of the mur- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 81 

der of Oldham, and the designs of the Pequots, 
a few weeks after his removal to Providence, 
he was the first to communicate the information 
to the Governor of Massachusetts. And to him, 
whom they had so recently driven into exilC; 
and who was still under the ban of their pro- 
scription, did the authorities of the colony com- 
mit the work of conciliating the Indians, and 
preventing the league, which might have brought 
desolation and bloodshed to all their homes. 

Mr. Williams accepted the hazardous and diffi- 
cult commission of mediating with the Narra- 
gansetts, by whose example the course of the 
other tribes would be governed, and of opposing 
the influence and designs of the Pequots. It 
was an enterprise of no common difficulty and 
peril, and it is not claiming too much for his 
influence with the Indians, to say, that he was 
the only man in New England who could have 
successfully executed it. In his letter to Major 
Mason, he mentions the leading incidents con- 
nected with the undertaking, and we follow the 
simple narrative he there gives. Upon receiving 
letters from Governor Vane, requesting him to 
use his utmost and speediest endeavors to hin- 
der and break the league, he embarks alone, 
without delay, in his canoe, scarcely informing 
his wife of the perilous voyage, and hastens 
over the troubled waters of the Narragansett, 

VOL. IV. 6 



82 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

" cutting through a stormy wind and great seas, 
every minute in hazard of Ufe," to the dwelhngs 
of Canonicus and Miantonomo. The Pequot 
ambassadors were already there, urging every 
consideration that could arouse the vengeance of 
these high-spirited though generous chiefs. They 
pictured before them the gloomy destiny, that 
was already settling down upon the Indian race, 
and pointed out to them the means by which 
the ancient possessors of the soil might regain 
the domain they had lost, and drive the white 
men from the country. The influences thus 
brought to bear upon their minds were well 
calculated to rouse the hostile feelings of a 
jealous and suspicious race, and the Narragan- 
setts were already wavering. 

In the midst of the savage passions thus 
powerfully at work in the hearts of the Indians, 
Williams passed three days and nights at the 
sachem's house, mingling with the Pequot am- 
bassadors, whose hands were still reeking with 
the blood of the English they had slain, and 
" from whom he nightly looked for their bloody 
knives at his own throat also." But his ardu- 
ous and perilous mission was crowned with suc- 
cess. The sachems, whose friendship he had 
long before acquired, yielded to his counsels. 
He was enabled to " break in pieces the Pequot 
negotiation and design, and to make and finish, 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 83 

by many travels and charges, the English league 
w^th the Narragansetts and Mohegans against 
the Pequots." 

The treaty, the terms of which were thus 
arranged by the negotiations of Mr. Williams 
with the Narragansetts, was ratified by the two 
contracting parties, at Boston, in October, 1636. 
Miantonomo, the chief of the tribe, and two 
sons of Canonicus, with a large number of at- 
tendants, made a visit, at the time, to the au- 
thorities of Massachusetts Bay, by whom they 
were received with much parade and demonstra- 
tion of respect, and with whom they established 
a perpetual alliance of offence and defence 
against the hostile Pequots, that was to be bind- 
ing alike upon themselves and their posterity. 
The treaty was at first written in the English 
language ; but, the Indians finding it difficult to 
understand it, from the imperfect explanations 
the magistrates were able to give, it was sent, 
probably at their own request, to Providence, 
to be interpreted to them by Mr. Williams ; a 
fact, which demonstrates the confidence placed 
in his integrity and friendship by both Indians 
and English. 

Thus was the whole negotiation dependent 
upon him alone. He broke the league which 
the Pequots were striving to form, and saved the 
feeble settlements of New England from the hor- 



84 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

rors of a universal savage war. He arranged 
the terms of the treaty with the Narragansetts^ 
and at last interpreted to them its language, and 
won for its stipulations the reluctant confidence 
of their suspicious natures. All this was effected, 
as he has informed us, only at great cost and 
travel, and at the sacrifice of many private in- 
terests, that were pressing themselves upon his 
attention. The pacification which he thus ac- 
complished was more useful and more glorious 
than conquest, and was the fruit of a heroism not 
less worthy of admiration. It was achieved by 
the self-sacrificing exertions of a spirit too gen- 
erous to remember its wrongs, and too elevated 
to think of its own necessities. 

But the services of Roger WiUiams to the peo- 
ple, who had banished him, did not end here. The 
Pequots, though foiled in their attempts to estab- 
lish a league with the neighboring tribes, could 
not be dissuaded from their purposes of ven- 
geance. With them the only question was, 
whether they should wait, in sullen inaction, the 
slow progress of the extinction which they fore- 
saw was their inevitable doom, or rush at once 
upon their enemies, and decide their destiny by 
a single onset of savage ferocity. They resolved 
upon the latter course, and, almost in the fury 
of desperation, determined single-handed to un- 
dertake the war. The murders which they per- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 85 

petrated, and the cruel tortures they inflicted upon 
some captives they seized, sent a chill of horror 
through the settlements of New England. The 
alarm was increased by their attack on the fort 
at Saybrook ; and the three colonies of Plym- 
outh, Massachusetts, and Connecticut resolved 
immediately to invade the territory of the Pe- 
quots, and, if possible, to destroy the tribe, who 
had vowed perpetual vengeance upon all the 
English. 

During the war, which continued for nearly 
a year, Mr. Williams was the constant adviser 
of the colonies, especially of the authorities of 
Massachusetts Bay, in all the difficult questions 
that were presented for their decision, and the 
watchful guardian of all their interests in their re- 
lations with the friendly Indians. He received the 
troops that marched from Boston against the Pe- 
quots, under General Stoughton, and entertained 
them at his own house in Providence, and accom- 
panied them to Narragansett in the expedition, 
when, at the request of the commander, he re- 
turned to be a medium of communication between 
the army and the people of the colony. He readi- 
ly sacrificed every private interest, and periled his 
life in their cause. His devotion to their affairs 
could not have been more constant and faithful, 
Iiad they never done him an injury, and had his 
happiness and his fame been identified with theirs 



86 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

His conduct, during the whole of this gloomy 
period in the history of New England, was such 
as entitles him to the perpetual gratitude of the 
people of Massachusetts ; for he was the instru- 
ment in the hands of Providence of saving her 
and her sister colonies from utter destruction. 
The subjoined letter, written to his friend Gov- 
ernor Winthrop, in the course of the Pequot 
war, will serve to bring to view more fully the 
character of the services he rendered to the gov- 
ernment at Boston. 

^' Sir, 

" The latter end of the last week, I guve 
notice to our neighbor Princes of your inten- 
tions and preparations against the common ene- 
my, the Pequots. At my first coming' to them, 
Canonicus (inorosus ccque ac harharus senex) was 
very sour, and accused the English and myself 
for sending the plague amongst them, and threat- 
ening to kill him especially. 

" Such tidings, it seems, were lately brought 
to his ears by some of his flatterers and our 
ill-willers. I discerned cause of bestirring my- 
self, and staid the longer, and at last, through the 
mercy of the Most High, I not only sweetened 
his spirit, but possessed him that the plague and 
other sicknesses were alone in the hand of the 
one God who made him and us, who, being dis- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 87 

pleased with the Enghsh for lying, stealing, idle- 
ness, and uncleanness, (the natives' epidemical 
sins,) smote many thousands of us ourselves, 
with general and late mortalities. 

" Miantonomo kept his barbarous court lately 
at my house, and with him I have far better 
dealing. He takes some pleasure to visit me, 
and sent me word of his coming over again 
some eight days hence. They pass not a week 
without some skirmishes, though hitherto little 
loss on either side. They were glad of your 
preparations, and in much conference with them- 
selves and others, (fishing, de industrid, for in- 
structions from them,) I gathered these obser- 
vations, which you may please, as cause may 
be, to consider and take notice of; 

" 1. They conceive, that to do execution to 
purpose on the Pequots will require, not two 
or three days and away, but a riding by it, and 
following of the work, to and again, the space 
of three weeks or a month ; that there be a 
falling off and a retreat, as if you were de- 
parted, and a falling on again, within three or 
four days, when they are returned again to their 
houses securely from their flight. 

" 2. That, if any pinnaces come in ken, they 
presently prepare for flight, women, and old men, 
and children, to a swamp, some three or four 
miles on the back of them, a marvellous great 



88 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

and secure swamp, which they called Ohomo- 
wauke, which signifies owi's nest, and by an- 
other name, Cappacommock, which signifies a ref- 
uge or hiding-place, as I conceive. 

"3. That, therefore, Niantick (which is Mi- 
antonomo's place of rendezvous) be thought on 
for the riding and retiring to of vessel or ves- 
sels, which place is faithful to the Narragansetts, 
and at present enmity with the Pequots. 

"4. They also conceive it easy for the Eng- 
lish, that the provisions and munitions first ar 
rive at Aquetneck, called by us Rhode Island, 
at the Narragansett's mouth, and then a mes- 
senger may be despatched hither, and so to 
the Bay, for the soldiers to march up by land to 
the vessels, who otherwise might spend long time 
about the cape, and fill more vessels than needs. 

" 5. That the assault should be in the night, 
when they are commonly more secure and at 
home, by which advantage, the English, being 
armed, may enter the houses, and do what exe- 
cution they please. 

'' 6. That, before the assault be given, an am- 
bush be laid behind them, between them and 
the swamp, to prevent their flight, &.c. 

" 7. That, to that purpose, such guides as shall 
be best liked of, be taken along to direct, es- 
pecially two Pequots, viz., Wequash and Wut- 
tackquiackommin, valiant men, especially the 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 89 

latter, who have lived there three or four years 
with the Narragansetts, and know every pass 
and passage among them, who desire armor to 
enter their houses. 

^' 8. That it would be pleasing to all natives 
that women and children be spared, &c. 

"9. That, if there be any more land travel 
to Connecticut, some course would also be taken 
with the Wunnashowatuckoogs, who are confed- 
erates with and a refuge to the Pequots. 

<' Sir, if any thing be sent to the Princes, I 
find that Canonicus would gladly accept of a 
box of eight or ten pounds of sugar, and, in- 
deed, he told me he would thank Mr. Governor 
for a box full. 

'' Sir, you may please to take notice of a 
rude view how the Pequots he. [Here follows, 
in the original, a map of the Pequot and Mo- 
hegan country.] 

" Thus with my best salutes to your worthy 
selves, and loving friends with you, and daily 
cries to the Father of mercies for a merciful 
issue to all these enterprises, I rest, 

" Your worship's unfeignedly respective, 
'' Roger Williams." 

The Pequot war was terminated by the eel 
ebrated battle fought near the fort on Mystic 
River, in May, 1637. It ended only in the 



90 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

extinction of the race. The forces of the Eng- 
lish, that were engaged in the battle, were the 
troops of Connecticut, with about twenty men 
from Massachusetts, and some hundreds of 
friendly Indians, the whole under the command 
of Major Mason, who had received the ensigns 
of authority at Hartford, from the fathers of the 
colony, amidst the solemn services of religion. 

A few days after the battle, the remaining 
troops, under General Stoughton, arrived from 
Massachusetts, and the few scattered bands of 
the Pequots were hunted from their hiding- 
places. Every village was destroyed, every field 
was laid waste, and the surviving remnant of 
the race, about two hundred in number, sur- 
rendering to their subjugators, were either sold 
into slavery by the colonists, or merged in the 
tribes that surrounded them. Their warriors 
had nearly all perished in battle. Sassacus, 
their principal sachem, was treacherously mur- 
dered by the Mohawks, to whom he had fled 
for protection. Not a single family remained to 
keep alive the Pequot name in the land of 
their ancestors. It was the beginning of the 
work of Indian extermination, which has since 
been so fearfully consummated. It conveyed a 
terrible lesson of the power of the English, but 
one that was justified, in most of its features, 
at least, by the circumstances in which the col- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 91 

onies were placed. They had done all in their 
power to avert the sad necessity ; but, when it 
could no longer be avoided, they determined to 
strike a blow that would not require to be re- 
peated. It sent terror through all the tribes of 
New England, and secured the peace of the 
country through an entire generation. The 
homes of the Pilgrims were safe from midnight 
marauders, their intercourse with the Indians 
was established on a friendly footing, and the 
pursuits of industry were crowned with liberal 
rewards beneath the genial auspices of protract- 
ed peace. 

Thus ended the first of the hopeless strug- 
gles, which the natives of New England made 
to withstand the melancholy doom which they 
too plainly saw was approaching them. The 
circumstances of the case left to the settlers no 
other alternative than a war of utter extermina- 
tion. The stern necessity that was placed upon 
them involved either their own destruction or 
the extinction of the treacherous and hostile 
tribe. 

We have seen the part which Roger Williams 
bore in the whole course of the troubles with 
the Pequots, and may well conclude, that to 
his active agency and superior knowledge of 
the Indian character and language their suc- 
cessful issue may in no small degree be attrib- 



92 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

uted. His perilous enterprise at the com- 
mencement of hostilities, and his indefatigable 
perseverance amidst all difficulties, secured the 
alliance of the Narragansetts, and his judicious 
counsels and accurate information dictated the 
plan and guided the progress of the campaign. 
The colony of Massachusetts Bay proclaimed a 
solemn thanksgiving at the close of the war, 
and received in triumph their General and his 
troops as they returned from the victory. But 
they passed no vote of thanks, and presented 
no civic rewards, to him, who had done for 
them what soldiers could not have effected, who 
had performed, in breaking the designs of the 
Pequots, what has been well pronounced to be 
" the most intrepid and most successful achieve- 
ment in the whole war ; an action as perilous 
in its execution as it was fortunate in its 
issue." * 

Some hearts, indeed, as he himself relates, 
were touched with relentings towards him ; and 
even Governor Winthrop moved the question in 
the Council, and it was debated, whether lie 
had not merited not only to be recalled from 
banishment, but also to be honored with some 
mark of favor. "It is known," he significant- 
ly adds, " who hindered, who never promoted, 



* Bancroft's Histonj of the United States, Vol. I. p. 399 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 93 

the liberty of other men's consciences.'' * The 
authorities basely suffered the occasion to pass 
by without any expression of gratitude for his 
services, or of the estimation in which they 
deserved to be held. The decree of banish- 
ment was never revoked, and the principles of 
the founder of Rhode Island were rendered 
scarcely less odious to the ministers and Gen- 
eral Court of Massachusetts by his becoming 
the benefactor and savior of the colony. They 
were deemed prejudicial to the interests of re- 
ligion, and, therefore, dangerous to the state ; 
and no degree of private worth or amount of 
public services could atone for the heresy of 
his opinions. It is not strange that the natural 
feelings of some proved treacherous to the 
wretched fallacies in which their understandings 
were involved. The magistrates could accept 
his services to the state, and confide to his 
negotiation its most vital interests; but, as guar- 

* Letter to Mason. The allusion is to Governor Dud- 
ley, who was distinguished above some others of the 
magistrates for his zeal against heresy. The subject 
seems occasionally to have awaked "the indignant muse" 
within him. At his death, some verses, written in his 
own hand, were found upon his person, containing the 
following characteristic couplet; 

" Let men of God, in court and churches, watch 
O'er such as do a toleration hatch," 



94 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

dians of the popular faith, they could not al- 
low him to step his foot within their jurisdiction, 
because he denied their authority in matters of 
conscience. So great was the perversion, which 
mistaken views of religious duty were suffered 
to work in the impulses and affections of the 
otherwise generous and noble-minded fathers of 
Massachusetts Bay. 



CHAPTER IX. 

Inadequacy of Legislation for the Suppression 
of Heresy. — Account of Mrs. Hutchinson 
and her Controversy in Massachusetts. — Her 
Adherents are received at Providence. — They 
settle on Rhode Island. — Williams^ s Agency 
in the Purchase of the Island. — Relations of 
the Colony at Providence with Massachusetts. 
— Account of Samuel Gorton, — His Settle- 
ment at Pawtuxet. — His Difficulties ivith the 
People of Providence. 

If any illustrations were needed of the utter 
inefficiency of even the most watchful vigilance 
of the civil or ecclesiastical authorities, in se- 
curing uniformity of religious sentiment in the 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 95 

minds of a people, they are presented, in the 
most striking manner, in the early history of 
the colony of Massachusetts Bay. The settlers 
at Salem, in the first year of their town, in 
their zeal for the Puritan faith, had sent home 
to England John and Samuel Browne, two of 
their leading and most enterprising fellow-emi- 
grants, by the return of the very ship in which 
they arrived. Their offence consisted in setting 
up a worship in Salem according to the forms 
of the Common Prayer, and the liturgy of the 
established church. Thus was Episcopacy ban- 
ished as soon as it appeared, and its leaders 
transported, like criminals, beyond the sea. Six 
years later, the General Court of the colony, 
guided by the advice of the clergy, had passed 
a decree of perpetual banishment against Roger 
Williams, for asserting the freedom of con- 
science. Many others, at different periods, had 
been summoned to the bar of the same tri- 
bunal, to answer for their opinions. Of these, 
some had given satisfactory explanations, while 
others had either voluntarily retired from Mas- 
sachusetts, or been forced beyond her jurisdic- 
tioi: Still strange opinions multiplied among 
the people, in spite of all the exertions that were 
made to suppress them, until, at a synod held 
at Cambridge, on the 30th of August, 1637, 
and attended by the ministers and magistrates 



96 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

of the whole colony, there were found, to the 
dismay of the Puritans, not less than eighty-two 
errors in doctrine, requiring their condemnation. 
Of these, by far the most important, and the 
most dreaded, were the principles at that time 
promulgated by Mrs. Anne Hutchinson, who, in 
the summer of 1636, with her husband, had 
arrived at Boston. She was a woman of rare 
endowments of intellect, and brilliant qualities 
of both person and character. Her mind, tinged 
with a shade of fanaticism, was of that impas- 
sioned and fervid cast, which enabled her to 
clothe her peculiar doctrines in the charms of 
a fascinating eloquence, and easily to subject 
to her sway the opinions of those, who were 
not entirely quiescent beneath the despotism of 
the prevailing theology of the times. The char- 
acter of her opinions, and the theological strife 
to which they gave occasion, have often been 
described in the histories of the period to which 
this narrative relates, and they need not here 
be repeated. The questions at issue were, in 
most respects, the same as have perplexed the 
minds and divided the opinions of Christians in 
every age of the church, and about which uni- 
formity of sentiment is never to be hoped for. 
At this period, however, they broke out into a 
controversy in every way the most remarkable 
in our history, which raged for more than a 



R O G E R W I L L I A M S . 97 

year, and was terminated only by the banish- 
ment of Mrs. Hutchinson, and some of her most 
influential adherents, and the subjection of the 
remainder to such restrictions and disabilities 
as eventually drove them from the colony. 

This celebrated controversy was greatly pro- 
tracted bv the distinsfuished abilities and hi^h 
standing of many of those, who espoused the 
cause of Mrs. Hutchinson. Boston was the 
principal seat of the new opinions. Governor 
Vane, at that time the chief magistrate of the 
colony, avowed himself on the side of the 
heresy, and actually wrote against the enact- 
ments which the Court had passed concerning 
it. Mr. Cotton, also, at whose house the Gov- 
ernor then resided, gave at least the indirect 
sanction of his influential name to the same 
views. But the only one among the clergy, 
who stood forth as a leader of the party, that 
thus rose in rebellion against the spiritual au- 
thorities of the age, was John Wheelwright, the 
brother of Mrs. Hutchinson. In a fast-day ser- 
mon, he had earnestly vindicated his doctrines, 
and, on being censured by the Court for sedi- 
tion, had increased their exasperation against 
him by threatening to appeal to the King. A 
synod of the ministers and delegates of all the 
churches was called to pass judgment upon the 
questions, which thus divided the opinions of 

VOL. IV. 7 



98 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

the colony. After a protracted session of three 
weeks, during which time the numerous errors 
of doctrine reported to the synod were the 
subject of long and angry debate, they pro- 
nounced against them their decided condemna- 
tion. But the strife only became the more furious, 
and the denunciations of both parties the more 
vehement ; until, at length, the General Court 
summoned to its bar Mrs. Hutchinson, and Mr. 
Wheelwright, and Mr. Aspinwall, the leading 
advocates of the heretical opinions, and placed 
them on trial for heresy. The trial resulted in 
the banishment of the persons named above 
from the jurisdiction of tlie colony. The magis- 
trates, at the same time, proceeded to admeasure 
still more remarkable. Upon the pretence of 
their having meditated an armed insurrection, in 
threatening to appeal to the King, the remain- 
ing adherents of Mrs. Hutchinson were required 
to give up the arms and ammunition in their 
possession, and were forbidden, upon penalty of 
a fine, to buy or borrow any others, until per- 
mitted by the Court.* By this order, nearly sixty 
of the citizens of Boston, and many in the ad- 
jacent towns, were deprived of the right to keep 
fire-arms, enjoyed by the other inhabitants of the 
colony. 



* Savage's JVinthrop, Vol. 1. p. 247. 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 99 

A I'dtge number of the people, who had been 
thus proscribed as heretics by the General Court, 
departed from Boston, under the guidance of 
John Clarke and WiUiam Coddington, wdth the 
intention of forming a settlement upon the shores 
of Delaware Bay. In their journey southward, 
they were kindly received and " lovingly enter- 
tained," at Providence, by Roger Williams, w^ho 
advised them to settle on Narragansett Bay, and 
recommended either Sowams* or Aquetneck as 
a suitable site for their plantation. In order to 
ascertain whether these places came wdthin the 
patents of the neighboring colonies, the emigrants 
sent Mr. Williams, with a deputation of their 
company, to Plymouth, to make the necessary 
inquiries. At Plymouth they were told, that 
Sowams was " the garden of their patent," and 
were advised to go to Aquetneck, where they 
might plant a colony, and be free from the juris- 
diction of any of their neighbors. Accordingly, 
on the return of the embassy to Providence, the 
emigrants decided to abandon their journey south- 
ward, and settle upon the beautiful island, whose 
luxuriant soil and salubrious climate spread their 
attractions before them. They obtained a grant 

* Sowams is now Barrington. Aquetneck was named 
hie of Rhodes, or Rhode Island, in 1644, as is supposed 
from some resemblance to tlie Island of Rhodes in the 
Mediterranean Sea. R. I. Hist. Cott. Vol. IV. p. 88. 



100 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

of the island from the chiefs of the Narragan- 
setts, to whom it belonged, and at the end of 
March, 1638, commenced the settlement at 
Portsmouth, near its northern extremity. The 
price paid to the sachems was forty fathoms of 
white beads. In addition to this, the setders 
bought the lands of the native occupants, in 
some instances paying for them twice over, to 
satisfy conflicting claims ; so that, with the pres- 
ents that were given, and the money that was 
paid, the purchase is said to have been one of 
the dearest that had then been made of lands 
in New England. 

In negotiating the purchase of Rhode Island, 
the settlers were mainly dependent upon the ex- 
ertions of Mr. Williams, who, upon this occasion, 
displayed the same obliging spirit, which always 
animated him, when the interests of others were 
to be promoted, or their rights maintained. His 
sympathies were strongly enlisted in behalf of 
the exiled band, who had separated from their 
brethren in Massachusetts for opinion's sake, 
and he lent the aid of his powerful influence 
with the Indian princes, in procuring for them 
a spot whereon to build a home. It was un- 
doubtedly by his exertions, aided by the honored 
name of Sir Henry Vane, that the grant of 
Rhode Island was first obtained ; and it was at 
his suggestion, that the liberal compensations and 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 101 

gratuities were paid to the natives, which se- 
cured to the colonists a peaceful possession, and 
rendered their commonwealth so flourishing and 
happy. He has left an account of his agency 
in this transaction, in a letter, written in 1653, 
at a period when, in consequence of the questions 
which had been raised, he judged it " not un- 
seasonable to declare the rise and bottom of the 
planting of Rhode Island." 

" It was not price, nor money," says he, '* that 
could have purchased Rhode Island. It was ob- 
tained by love ; by the love and favor which that 
honorable gentleman. Sir Henry Vane, and my- 
self, had with that great sachem, Miantonomo, 
about the league, which I procured between the 
Massachusetts English and the Narragansetts, in 
the Pequot war. It is true, I advised a gratuity 
to be presented to the sachem and to the na- 
tives ; and because Mr. Coddington and the rest 
of my loving countrymen were to inhabit the 
place, and to be at the charge of the gratuities, 
I drew up a writing in Mr. Coddington's name, 
and in the names of such of my loving coun- 
trymen as came up with him, and put it into as 
sure a form as I could at that time, for the 
benefit and assurance of the present and future 
inhabitants of the island." 

Here, upon the most beautiful and fertile isl- 
and along the coast of New England, beyond 



102 A3IERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

the jurisdiction of a jealous court, amidst the 
refreshing breezes and the varying scenery of 
the ocean, did the persecuted heretics of Mas- 
sachusetts at length dwell in quiet ; ^' an out- 
cast people from the over-zealous colonies," as 
they styled themselves, " bearing vv^ith the sev- 
eral judgments and consciences of each other.'* 
The little colony thrived beneath the favorable 
influences of its genial situation, and the spirit- 
ua. freedom guarantied to its inhabitants soon 
extended itself to the southern shores of the isl- 
and, and to the other islands of the bay. This 
secluded settlement was the retreat of Mrs. 
Hutchinson ; where, having a more limited thea- 
tre of action, and removed from those who de- 
nounced her views, and especially from a civil 
authority that asserted jurisdiction in matters of 
opinion, she laid aside her character of theologi- 
cal reformer, and led the quiet life of a private 
lady; as, perhaps, she might always have done, 
had not her peculiar opinions, and her early de- 
parture from womanly propriety, been magnified 
to undue importance by the indiscreet censures 
of the over-zealous ministers and magistrates of 
Massachusetts. 

The eventful life of this celebrated woman 
was brought to a close so melancholy and tragi- 
cal, as, at any other period than one of ex- 
traordinary bigotry and severity, would have 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 103 

changed every feeling of anger and resentment 
into pity and sorrow. On the death of her hus- 
band, in 1642, she removed her residence to 
Long Island, where, in the year following, she 
ivas murdered by the Indians, with her whole 
family, comprising sixteen persons, with the ex- 
ception of one daughter, who was carried away 
into an unknown captivity. Her tragical death, 
and the extinction of her family, served but to 
confirm her enemies in Massachusetts in their 
convictions of her wickedness, and the justice of 
their proceedings against her. They were con- 
fidently regarded as a revelation of the judg- 
ment of God against her destructive heresies, 
which, even in the distant wilderness to which 
she had fled, could not escape the righteous 
retributions of Heaven. 

Such is ever the spirit of intolerance. It 
narrows and dwarfs the intellect by the fallacies 
it employs, and the suspicions it engenders. It 
steels the heart, and crushes its generous sym- 
pathies, and converts even the misfortunes and 
sufferings of its victims into justifications of its 
own severities. 

The events, which we have thus narrated, 
had an important influence upon the affairs of 
the settlement at Providence, and the narration 
of them was necessary in order to illustrate the 
spirit of the time, and the character of the in- 



104 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

dividual whose life we are tracing. They pre- 
sent his character and principles in striking con- 
trast with those of the other leading men of that 
day. They imposed upon him offices of disin- 
terested benevolence, the performance of which 
must have engrossed his attention and consumed 
his time, even while the support of his family 
and the interests of his colony were subjects of 
pressing solicitude. The arbitrary proceedings, 
adopted by the government of Massachusetts 
Bay against Mrs. Hutchinson and her adherents, 
drove from that colony many of its citizens, and 
in this manner contributed largely to the growth 
of the plantations at Providence, where the 
refugees were sure to be welcomed with a ready 
and generous hospitality. The offspring of Mas- 
sachusetts, it thus became the home of the dis- 
affected and the banished, whom she had cast 
out from her citizens. It could hardly be ex- 
pected that the persons, whom she had thus 
driven into exile, would entertain very favorable 
opinions of the justice of the proceedings against 
them. A letter written from Providence, and 
complaining of the acts of the General Court, 
and the prevailing spirit of the colony, was 
brought to the notice of the authorities. In 
consequence of this, it was ordered, that, if 
any one of the settlers at Providence should be 
found within the jurisdiction of Massachusetts 



ROGER WILLIAMS 105 

he should be brought before one of the magis- 
trates, and, if he gave his sanction to the letter, 
he should be sent home, and forbidden to come 
again into the jurisdiction, upon pain of im- 
prisonment and further censure.* 

Acts like this, however, seem to have pro- 
duced no change in the spirit or conduct of 
Williams. He still exerted himself on every oc- 
casion to preserve the peace of New England, 
to maintain the rights of the natives, and to 
conciliate their good-will towards all the col- 
onies. His spirit and conduct are well exem- 
plified in the course, which he pursued with 
respect to the murder of an Indian, near Paw- 
tucket, by four Englishmen, who had been ser- 
vants in Plymouth, and had absconded from 
their masters. The murderers fled to Providence, 
where they were, at first, kindly received by Mr. 
Williams, who was as yet ignorant of their crime. 
They had scarcely departed, when intelligence 
was brought him of the murder, and of the ex- 
citement and alarm it produced among the In- 
dians. He immediately despatched messengers 
for the apprehension of the men, and repaired 
himself to the spot, where the murdered man 
was found, and received from him, just as he 
was dying, an account of the aflfair. The men 

^ Winthrop, Vol. I. p. 256. 



106 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

were soon apprehended, and brought to Provi- 
dence ; and, by the advice of Governor Winthrop, 
they were carried to Plymouth, within whose ju- 
risdiction the crime had been committed. One 
of them subsequently escaped ; but the remaining 
three were tried and executed, in the presence 
of Mr. Williams and some Indians of the tribe, 
to which the murdered man belonged, whom he 
invited to accompany him to witness the justice 
which white men awarded to the murderer of 
an Indian. 

Conduct like this, in vindication of the rights 
of the natives, and in promoting the peace and 
happiness of all the inhabitants of the country, 
did not fail to secure the abiding confidence of 
the Indian chiefs. In every question that arose 
between them and the English, he was made 
their adviser, and often became the mediator 
between the parties. In the year 1640, there 
were rumors abroad of new mischiefs plotting 
among the Indians. The Governor of Massa- 
chusetts strengthened the defences of the colony, 
and sent an agent to the Narragansetts, to as- 
certain the truth of the rumors, and to invite 
the sachem to Boston, for the purpose of re- 
newing a good understanding with the author- 
ities. The reports were all denied by Mianto- 
nomo, who expressed his readiness to come to 
Boston, provided Mr. Williams could accompany 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 107 

him as his friend and adviser. But the Court of 
Massachusetts refused to relax their sentence of 
banishment against him, even to allow a tem- 
porary visit to the colony, on an errand so dis- 
interested and important to its peace and well- 
being. 

The sternness with which Massachusetts ad- 
hered to the letter of the sentence, and the act 
of exclusion which she passed against all the in- 
habitants of Providence, operated exceedingly to 
their disadvantage. Boston was then the principal 
mart of trade in New England, and, by the act 
of the Court, those who had been forbidden to 
enter Massachusetts were obliged to forego many 
of the comforts of life, which could only be ob- 
tained there, as well as the profits of the trade 
they might have carried on with the inhabitants. 
Roger Williams himself complains, that many 
thousand pounds would not repay the losses he 
sustained in being thus debarred from commerce 
with the English and natives of Massachusetts. 
In referring to this period of his hfe, he says his 
*' time was spent day and night, at home and 
abroad, on the land and water, at the hoe and 
at the oar, for bread." He was poor, and obliged 
to labor constantly for his support ; and, even 
with his utmost exertions, in those early times, 
he and his fellow-settlers at Providence must 
often have been reduced to privations and suf- 



108 AMERICAN BIOGKAPHY. 

ferings, which their prosperous and wealthy 
descendants can now but inadequately conceive. 

Among the turbulent spirits, whose erratic 
career was connected with the life of Roger 
Williams, was Samuel Gorton, a wild and rest- 
less enthusiast, who arrived at Boston in 1636. 
He soon removed to Plymouth, where, falling into 
a difficulty with the minister and the authorities, 
he was sentenced to pay a fine, and to give 
bonds for his subsequent good behavior. From 
Plymouth, he went to Rhode Island, where it 
is stated, though upon insufficient grounds, that 
he was tried as a disturber of the peace, and 
condemned to be pubhcly whipped. He at 
length came to Providence, where Roger Wil- 
liams, with his usual humanity, received him to 
his hospitality, and offered him a shelter. Here 
he soon became the occasion of no small diffi- 
culty to the inhabitants, whose simple compact 
of voluntary association rendered social feuds of 
easy growth. The town was already distracted 
by the disputes, which had grown out of the 
division of the lands, and the ambiguous lan- 
guage in which the title was originally conveyed 
to Williams. 

Gorton, having purchased a tract of land at 
Pawtuxet, in the south part of the Providence 
purchase, was soon joined by some of his ad- 
herents, who had been disfranchised at Newport 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 109 

A quarrel immediately sprang up between them 
and the inhabitants of Providence, which long 
disturbed the peace of the colony, and came 
well nigh ending in violence and bloodshed. 
The parties became exasperated, and went forth 
against each other with arms, bent upon settling 
the controversy by blows. But Mr. Williams, 
mortified at the existence of so disgiaceful a 
feud, pacified the combatants, and persuaded 
them to retire without violence. Yet this did 
not settle the strife. No arbitration could allay 
the stormy passions which had been excited. 
The infant colony, at that time without a gov- 
ernment, and under no control save that of 
the popular sentiment, was completely distracted 
by the controversy. In this state of things, a 
few individuals of the weaker party sent an ap- 
peal to Massachusetts for aid, in settling the 
peace of the colony. The application was re- 
fused ; but the act itself prepared the way for 
a series of attempts, on the part of Massachusetts, 
to usurp the control of aflfairs at Providence, 
until, at length, she asserted absolute jurisdiction 
over the whole settlement. 

To this proceeding of his fellow-planters Mr. 
Williams seems never to have given the slight- 
est sanction, though the opposite has been fre- 
quently afldrmed. He was opposed to the prin- 
ciples of Gorton, and was displeased with his 



110 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

conduct; yet he would not withhold from him 
the hospitality and shelter he sought. He evi- 
dently regarded him as a man of troublesome 
opinions and wayward impulses, but not on 
this account to be driven from the colony. Ac- 
cordingly, Gorton was allowed to purchase land 
at Providence, though he never signed the com- 
pact by which the inhabitants bound themselves 
to each other ; a circumstance which renders 
his conduct still more ungrateful and repre- 
hensible. 

A year or two later, the feud still remaining 
unabated, four of the residents at Pawtuxet, who 
were opposed to Gorton, gave in their alle- 
giance to Massachusetts, in order that he might 
be brought to punishment. The authorities of 
the Bay, in those days, were seldom very scru- 
pulous about extending their jurisdiction, and 
immediately began to exercise the prerogatives 
of government over the citizens of Providence. 
Gorton and his adherents obeyed the dictates 
of prudence, and removed beyond the Pawtuxet 
River, the southern boundary of Providence, to 
Shawomet, or Warwick, where they purchased 
lands of the natives, and commenced a settle- 
ment. But the authorities of Massachusetts were 
not thus to be defeated. They set up a plea 
of jurisdiction even here, and sent an armed 
force, with orders to seize Gorton, and bring 



ROGER WILLIAMS. Ill 

him to Boston for trial. The trial, which pro 
cceded on a general ciiarge of his being an 
enemy of religion, and a disturber of the peace, 
terminated in a severe sentence, by which he 
and his associates were doomed to imprison- 
ment during the winter, and compelled to hard 
labor with an iron chain bolted fast upon their 
limbs. 

These unfortunate men, whose only crimes 
were their wild and fanatical opinions, were 
separated from each other, and imprisoned in 
solitude in several of the towns about Boston; 
they were forbidden, upon penalty of death, to 
speak to any one save an officer of the church 
or of the colony ; and, at the close of a dreary 
winter's confinement, barely escaping with their 
lives, were banished from Massachusetts. Gor- 
ton, accompanied by two of his associates, after- 
wards went to England, where they represented 
their wrongs to the Earl of Warwick and the 
Commissioners for the Plantations, and obtained 
from them a full recognition of their title to 
the lands at Shawomet, and an order to the 
authorities of Massachusetts to allow them un- 
molested possession of their rights. 

These events were eminently fitted to suggest 
lessons and reflections, which did not fail to 
affect the sagacious mind of Mr. Williams. He 
had already had abundant opportunities of learn- 



112 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

ing the arbitrary and inquisitorial spirit of the 
neighboring colony ; but he probably had not 
before been fully aware of the tendency to tu- 
mult and trouble existing among the members 
of his own settlement, or of the absolute ne- 
cessity of some more efficient organization than 
the simple bond of a common faith in the same 
principles of civil freedom, and the compact of 
town fellowship, which had hitherto bound them 
together. In connection also with subsequent 
proceedings on the part of the other colonies 
of New England, these events prepared the way 
for important changes in the affairs of Prov- 
idence, which opened new spheres for the benev- 
olent enterprises and exertions of its founder. 

They also illustrate, as fully as records can do 
it, the difficulties with which the heterodox col- 
ony was so long obliged to contend, and are 
sufficient to satisfy every candid reader, that 
Massachusetts Bay had but slender claims upon 
the gratitude of her offspring for any assistance 
she rendered, in relieving the necessities or mit- 
igating the trials incident to an infant settle- 
ment in the wilderness. 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 113 



CHAPTER X. 



The Neio England Confederacy. — The Colo- 
nies in Rhode Island excluded. — They appeal 
to the King. — Williams is appointed their 
Agent, and sails for England. — Obtains a 
Charter. — Publishes the ''Bloody Tenet.^^ — 
He returns to Rhode Island with the Char- 
ter. — His Reception at Providence. — His 
Pacif cation of the Indians. — Organization 
of a Government under the Charter. — Spirit 
of its early Legislation. 

The year 1643 was rendered memorable by 
the establishment of the earliest confederacy 
among the colonies of New England. It was 
a union of great importance to the interests 
of those embraced in it, and may be regarded 
as, in some sort, the germ of the subsequent 
confederations which have marked the history 
of the American people. The objects which 
were proposed in its formation were mutual 
protection against the depredations of the In- 
dian tribes, who were now every year becoming 
more formidable by their acquisition of fire- 
ai"ms, and against the encroachments of the 
Dutch and the French, whose plantations skirt- 
ed the settlements of the English, together with 

VOL. IV. 8 



114 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

the preservation of the hberty and peace of the 
gospel, and the advancement of the kingdom of 
Jesus Christ. The league, which contained the 
articles of the union, was signed at Boston, on 
the 19th of May, by the commissioners of the 
several colonies of Plymouth, Massachusetts Bay. 
Connecticut, and New Haven. 

By the terms of the confederacy, it was ar- 
ranged that two commissioners should be annu- 
ally chosen by each colony, to meet successively 
at Boston, Hartford, New Haven, and Plymouth, 
once in a year, or oftener, if the exigencies of 
the times should require, who should form a 
kind of central government, with power to de- 
termine all questions relating to war and peace, 
and provide for the general administration of 
justice, and the common welfare of all the 
colonies. The independence, however, of each 
of the several governments was strictly pre- 
served ; for the local jurisdiction remained 
unimpaired, and the commissioners, in reality, 
could do little more than discuss the matters 
submitted to them, and recommend, for the 
adoption of the colonies, the measures they 
might deem expedient. They had no power 
to enforce a single decree, or to alter or annul 
a single proceeding of the colonial assemblies. 

The colony at Providence, formed, as it had 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 115 

been, principally of the outcast and banished 
from the other settlements of New England, 
was not invited to join the confederacy ; and 
her subsequent application for admission, like 
that of the settlers on Rhode Island, was stern- 
ly refused. The reason alleged at the time 
was the want of a regular charter of govern- 
ment, though, from the fact that, when this 
objection w^as removed, the refusal was still 
persisted in, we may well infer that other con- 
siderations determined the action of the con- 
federate colonies. The entire separation of re- 
ligion from the control of the civil power, and 
the catholic and tolerant spirit which charac- 
terized the inhabitants of Providence, were 
peculiarly offensive to their neighbors, and un- 
doubtedly constituted the principal cause of 
the exclusion of the colony from the New Eng- 
land confederacy. The spirit which banished 
Roger Williams from Massachusetts had lost 
none of its sternness and severity, and would 
now regard with no favorable disposition the 
plantations which embodied his principles, and 
were growing up beneath his care. The in- 
habitants of Providence were thus left exposed 
to all the inconveniences and dangers incident 
to an isolated position, among barbarians on 
the one hand, and powerful and united neigh- 
bors on the other. In every emergency, they 



116 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

must rely on their own resources, and trust to 
their own unaided strength. Had the Httle 
state, stung by this ingratitude and humiha- 
tion, retahated the injuries she had received, 
it would have been no extraordinary act, and 
would have found, at least, some palliation in 
the political necessities to which she was re- 
duced. So great was the influence of her 
founder with the Indians, that their friendship 
might easily have been withdrawn from the 
other colonies, and her admission to the con- 
federacy been compelled by the troubles she 
might thus have occasioned them. 

No such spirit, however, was harbored in 
the minds of Williams and his associates. Their 
influence, while it was able to protect their 
colony amidst the perils which threatened its 
existence, was exerted, in every instance, to ap- 
pease the vengeance of the savages, and pro- 
tect the lives and interests of their countrymen; 
and, had their views been oftener regarded, the 
early annals of New England might have been 
free from, at least, some of the blots that now 
darken their pages. 

The increasing prosperity of the colonies at 
Providence, and on Rhode Island, together with 
their exclusion from the confederacy, and the 
frequent declarations made by tlieir enemies, 
that they had no authority for civil govern- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 117 

ment, at length induced them to unite in seek- 
ing the favor and protection of the mother 
country. The mission was intrusted to Mr. 
WilHams. It was one of considerable difficulty, 
and of vast importance ; for upon its success- 
ful accomplishment depended even the exist- 
ence of the colony. He accepted the high 
trust thus committed to him, and, by reason 
of his exclusion from the territories of Massa- 
chusetts, proceeded to New York, to embark 
for England. And here, while waiting for the 
ship to go to sea, an opportunity was pre- 
sented him to exert his influence with the In- 
dians, and save the colony at Manhattoes from 
a desolating war. The Indians of Long Island, 
exasperated by the wanton cruelties of the 
Dutch, had risen against them in great fury. 
They had burned the house and murdered the 
family of Mrs. Hutchinson, and assaulted the 
dwelling of Lady Moody, an inhabitant of the 
island, who had lately removed from Massa- 
chusetts. It was by the intercession of Wil- 
liams, and that peculiar influence, which, more 
than any other man, he possessed with the In- 
dians, that their fury was appeased, and peace 
restored to the settlements of the Dutchmen. 

In the course of the summer of 1643, he set 
sail from New York for his native land. Of the 
length or the incidents of the voyage he has 



118 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

left no written account. He beguiled its wean 
some days by preparing a " Key to the In 
DiAN Languages," which he drew up, as he 
says, '^ as a private help to my own memory, 
that I might not, by my present absence, lightly 
lose what I had so dearly bought in some few 
years' hardship and charges among the barba- 
rians." It was pubhshed soon after his arrival 
in England, and was the first attempt which 
had then been made to explain, in English, the 
language and manners of the North American 
Indians. It contains much valuable information, 
and is still regarded as one of the best expo- 
sitions of the subjects to which it relates. 

Mr. Williams arrived in England in the midst 
of the civil war which then distracted the na- 
tion, and but a short time after the popular 
party had seen Hampden, the purest and no- 
blest of their leaders, cut down by the foe on 
the field of Chalgrove. The fate of the Eng 
lish monarchy was suspended on the crisis. The 
nation was hurried on through a series of tu- 
multuous events. The Parhament gained the 
ascendency ; Charles the First was sent to the 
scaffold, and the ambition of Cromwell found a 
way for the accomplishment of its vast schemes 
of aggrandizement. This disturbed state of pub- 
lic affairs was, on the whole, favorable to the 
objects of Mr. Williams. The Parliament, as yet 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 119 

distrustful of their position, and uncertain re- 
specting the issues of the revolution they had 
set on foot, were willing to conciliate the favor 
of the colonies, and intrusted their affairs to the 
administration of the Earl of Warwick, as Gov- 
ernor-General and Lord High Admiral of the 
colonies in America, with a council composed 
of five peers and twelve commoners. Among 
the commoners w^ho sat at the council-board 
of the Earl of Warwick w^as Sir Henry Vane, 
the early friend of Roger Williams, and his il- 
lustrious compeer in advocating the doctrines 
of religious freedom. By him Mr. Williams was 
received with a cordial welcome, and presented 
to the commissioners of the colonies, who list- 
ened to his views with marked attention, and, 
in the name of the King, granted him a char- 
ter for the towns of Providence, Portsmouth, 
and Newport, to be entitled ^' The Incorpora- 
tion of Providence Plantations in the Narragan- 
sett Bay in New England." The instrument 
bore the date of March 14th, 1644, and con- 
veyed to the inhabitants of these towns full pow- 
er and authority to adopt such a form of civil 
government, and " to make and ordain such 
civil laws and constitutions, as they, or the great- 
est part of them, shall by free consent agree 
unto." The charter distinctly recognized the 
principle on which the colony was founded, 



120 AxMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

and which the inhabitants had carefully cher- 
ished, that government should concern civil 
things alone ; and within this sphere it imposed 
no limitation, save only that the ordinances that 
might be adopted should not conflict with the 
laws of England. 

During his residence in England, notwith- 
standing the engrossing nature of his mission, 
and the civil strifes that were raging around 
him, Mr. Williams found leisure to write and 
publish his famous book called " The Bloody 
Tenet of Persecution for Cause of Conscience." 
In this, the ablest of his works, in the form of 
a dialogue between Truth and Peace, he dis- 
cusses the doctrines of religious freedom, for 
which he had always contended, and in the 
maintenance of which he had made so many 
sacrifices. The work was printed in London, 
without the author's name, in 1644. It was 
dedicated to the High Court of Parliament, and 
from the beauties of its style, and the great in- 
terest of the subject, was fitted to command 
unusual attention, especially at that early dawn 
of intellectual liberty in England. Mr. Cotton, 
of Boston, wrote a reply, which, in accordance 
with the quaint and singular taste of the age, 
he entitled '' The Bloody Tenet washed and 
made white in the Blood of the Lamb." After 
some time, Mr. Williams published a rejoinder, 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 121 

which, in the same style then so common in 
theological writings, he called " The Bloody 
Tenet yet more bloody by Mr. Cotton's En- 
deavor to wash it white." 

The question at issue between these two emi- 
nent disputants has long since been decided on 
the side of Mr. Williams, by the general voice 
of the Protestant world ; and the writings to 
which it gave rise now only serve to show how 
far he strode before even the most gifted spirits 
of his time in the perception and assertion 
of the rights of the soul. Though the writings 
of Cotton and of Williams conduct the reader 
to widely different conclusions, and are distin- 
guished from each other by marked character- 
istics, yet the controversy, on both sides, was 
conducted in a spirit of courtesy and candor 
unusual in that age of bitter strife and severe 
personalities. 

The errand of Mr. Williams in England was 
now accomplished, and in the summer of 1644 
he embarked for America. Thirteen years had 
passed since he first set sail, a youthful emi- 
grant to the untried settlements of the new 
world. How changed was now his condition ! 
He had suffered persecution at the hands of 
his brethren, and tasted thd bitterness of a win- 
try exile ; but he had also become the father 
of a new colony, which embodied a great prin- 



122 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

ciple of civil society, now for the first time put 
in practice ; and he was bearing with him across 
the Atlantic a charter, which guarantied its ex- 
istence and exercise for ever. He arrived at 
Boston on the 17th of September, 1644, and 
landed in the forbidden territory of Massachu- 
setts Bay, by virtue of the following letter which 
had been given to him in England, signed by 
several members of both houses of Parliament, 
and addressed " to the Governor and Assistants, 
and the rest of our worthy friends in the Plan- 
tation of Massachusetts Bay, in New England." 

"Our much honored Friends, 

" Taking notice, some of us of long 
time, of Mr. Roger Williams's good affections 
and conscience, and of his sufferings by our 
common enemy and oppressors of God's people, 
the prelates, as also of his great industry and 
travels in his printed Indian labors, in your 
parts, (the like whereof we have not seen ex- 
tant from any part of America,) and in which 
respects it hath pleased both houses of Par- 
liament to grant unto him, and friends with 
him, a free and absolute charter of civil gov- 
ernment for those parts of his abode, and withal 
sorrowfully resenting, that, amongst good men, 
(our friends,) driven to the ends of the world, 
exercised with the trials of a wilderness, and 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 123 

who mutually give good testimony each of the 
other, (as we observe you do of him, and he 
abundantly of you,) there should be such a 
distance ; we thought it fit, upon divers con- 
siderations, to profess our great desires of both 
your utmost endeavors of nearer closing, and 
of ready expressing those good affections (which 
we perceive you bear to each other) in effec- 
tual performance of all friendly offices. The 
rather because of those bad neighbors you are 
likely to find too near you in Virginia, and the 
unfriendly visits from the west of England, 
and from Ireland. That however it may please 
the Most High to shake our foundations, yet 
the report of your peaceable and prosperous 
Plantations may be some refreshings to your 
true and faithful friends." 

This letter was delivered to the authorities 
of Massachusetts, but it wholly failed to soften 
their temper towards Mr. Williams, further than 
to allow him to proceed unmolested to Prov- 
idence. The magistrates, says Hubbard, upon 
the receipt of the letter, examined their hearts, 
but saw no reason to condemn themselves for 
their former proceedings against him. The he- 
retical colony, now that it had received a char- 
ter from the Council, and its founder had been 
applauded and honored by some of the leading 



124 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

members of the government in England, was 
an object of even greater distrust and suspicion 
than before. The heresies, which the fathers of 
Massachusetts had so often attempted to de- 
stroy, seemed now secure beneath the protec- 
tion of a separate government, and, in their 
estimation, were clothed with greater importance 
and power of mischief. 

But new honors awaited the return of Mr. 
Williams to his own colony. The news of his 
arrival at Boston had gone before him, and, as 
he proceeded on his journey homeward, along 
the scenes he once traversed as an exile, he 
found the waters of the Seekonk covered with 
canoes, containing the whole population of Provi- 
dence, who had come out to welcome his return 
and bear him back in triumph. It was a fitting 
expression of the gratitude and esteem in which 
the citizens of the colony held the character and 
services of its founder and greatest benefactor. 

The inhabitants of the several settlements, em- 
braced in the charter of Mr. Williams, were 
not prepared to enter at once upon the organ- 
ization of a common government, in accordance 
with its provisions. Many local questions were 
to be decided, and jarring interests were to be 
harmonized. Besides this, the distracted state 
of affairs in England created party divisions 
among the colonists of America. In this way 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 125 

the hopes and plans of Mr. Williams were de- 
ferred. But his services, as the pacificator of 
the Indians, were again immediately put in 
requisition, in settling the difficulties which had 
sprung up, in his absence, between the colonies 
and the Narragansetts. Miantonomo, the sachem 
of the tribe, the early and tried friend of the 
fathers of Rhode Island, had been put to death 
in circumstances which gave to the deed the 
aspect of wanton cruelty and injustice. In vio- 
lation of an existing treaty, he had made war 
upon Uncas, the Mohegan chief, and was de- 
feated and taken prisoner in battle. The con- 
queror carried the Narragansett warrior to Hart- 
ford, where he placed him in prison, and sub- 
mitted his fate to the commissioners of the United 
Colonies. It was in their power to save him, 
had such been their inclination ; but they asked 
the advice of " five of the most judicious el- 
ders," who, seeing in the unfortunate sachem 
not only the violator of the treaty, but the friend 
of Roger Williams and Samuel Gorton, gave 
their opinion that he deserved to die. The 
commissioners accepted the decision, and Mian- 
tonomo was escorted, by a guard of soldiers, 
into the territory of the Mohegans, where he was 
put to death by Uncas, in the presence of some 
English, who were sent to witness the shameful 
deed. Had this act been the simple dictate of 



126 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

barbarian revenge, it would have occasioned no 
surprise to those vv^ho are famihar w^ith the stern 
customs of savage warfare ; but that it should 
have been sanctioned and advised by Christian 
ministers, even at this distant day mantles the 
cheek with a blush of shame, at the weakness 
of principle and the bitterness of feeling which 
it betrays. 

It was not strange that the tribe burned to 
avenge the murder of their chief, for whose 
ransom, they alleged, they had paid the wampum 
which was stipulated. They soon commenced a 
war with the Mohegans, which they also threat- 
ened to extend to all the colonies of New Eng- 
land, except those at Providence and on Rhode 
Island, to which they had always been friendly, 
and from which, in return, they had received 
nothing but kindness. The commissioners held 
an extraordinary session in Boston, at which they 
received a letter from Roger Williams, informing 
them of the hostile determinations of the Narra- 
gansetts. No time was to be lost. It was im- 
mediately ordered, that three hundred men be 
sent to the aid of the Mohegans, the allies of the 
English. Two messengers were also despatched 
to the Narragansetts, to appease, if possible, their 
vengeance and prevent the war. 

The sachems of the tribe had already sent for 
Mr. Williams to advise them; and, on the arrival 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 127 

of the messengers, he acted as their interpreter, 
and united his influence with theirs to allay the 
hostile passions of the natives. By his media- 
tion, Passacus, the brother and successor of Mi- 
antonomo, was induced to go to Boston, attended 
by other chiefs of the tribe, where he concluded 
a treaty with the commissioners, which crushed 
forever the power, the independence, and the 
pride of the Narragansetts. The treaty was con- 
cluded on the 4th of August, 1645. By its pro- 
visions, the sachems agreed to pay to the com- 
missioners two thousand fathoms of wampum, 
as a remuneration for the expenses of the war, 
and left at Boston a child of Passacus, together 
with the children of some others of the chiefs, 
as hostages of their fidelity. Thus, again, were 
the settlements of New England saved from the 
desolations of Indian war, mainly by the dis- 
interested exertions and great personal influence 
of Mr. Williams. 

The several towns of the Providence Planta- 
tions at length agreed on a form of govern- 
ment, framed in accordance with the powers 
granted to them in the charter. It was adopted 
in a general assembly of the people of the col- 
ony, held at Portsmouth, in May, 1647; and, 
among its leading provisions, it required the an- 
nual election of a President and four assistants, in 



128 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

whom should be vested the executive power, 
and who should constitute the Supreme Court 
of trials for all cases of appeal from the local 
authorities of the towns. The legislative As- 
sembly was composed of six commissioners, from 
each of the towns, who should make laws, and 
order all the general affairs of the colony ; but, 
so jealous were the people of the exercise of 
any delegated authority, that the towns reserved 
to themselves the power of annulling any law, 
which their representatives might pass. The 
organization of the new government was a con- 
summation of great importance in the history of 
the little colony ; and to bring it about had 
enlisted the strongest interests and efforts of 
Mr. Williams. He strenuously sought to remove 
the petty jealousies, which the settlements had 
been in the habit of indulging towards each 
other, and to heal the divisions by which the 
people, composed as they were of many dis- 
cordant spirits and tenacious consciences, had 
long been distracted. It was, undoubtedly, in 
accordance with his own counsels, and to re- 
move every occasion of complaint on the part of 
the inhabitants of Rhode Island, that the office 
of President of the colony, which so naturally 
belonged to himself, was bestowed upon Mr. 
John Coggeshall, of Newport, at the first General 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 129 

Assemoly of election, while he accepted the 
humbler place of assistant for the town of Provi- 
dence. 

Among the acts passed at this first meeting 
of the colonial Assembly, was a resolution ma- 
king honorable mention of the services of Mr 
Williams in negotiating the charter, and, '' in 
regard to his so great trouble, charges, and good 
endeavors," granting him the sum of one hun- 
dred pounds, to be levied upon the three towns 
of the province, viz., fifty pounds from New- 
port, thirty pounds from Portsmouth, and twenty 
pounds from Providence. Inadequate as this 
compensation was to remunerate him even for 
the actual expenses incurred in his important 
mission, the whole of the sum was never paid. 
The poverty of the people may be pleaded as 
some slight extenuation of so gross neglect; but 
it is to be feared, that, in consequence of the 
party divisions, which then existed in the colony, 
as well as of the imperfect authority with which 
the government was invested, the obligations of 
public indebtedness were but slightly felt, and 
reluctantly acknowledged. 

At the same general meeting of the colony 
was adopted a code of laws, fashioned, in the 
main, after the existing laws of England, but 
strictly confining its regulations to civil things 
alone, and expressly declaring, in one of its pro- 

VOL. IV. 9 



130 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

visions, that " otherwise than in what is herein 
forbidden, all men may walk as their consciences 
persuade them, every one in the fear of his 
God." 

Such were the early government and the 
legislation of Rhode Island. It was the simple 
embodiment of the principles of her founder, 
and displays a spirit of freedom, and a practical 
wisdom, that stand out in bold contrast with the 
prevailing views of the older colonies, and would 
do honor to the statesmen and legislators of 
any age. 



CHAPTER XL 



Private Life of Williams. — Dissensions in Rhode 
Island. — Coddington's Commission. — Op- 
^ressive Policy of the United Colonies. — 
Treatment of John Clarice and others in Mas- 
sachusetts. — Dissatisfaction with Coddington. 
— Williams and Clarice are appointed Agents 
of the Colony. — They sail for England. 

During the years through which we have fol- 
lowed the fortunes of Mr. Williams up to the 
present point, some important changes had taken 
place in his private affairs. The character of 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 131 

minister of the gospel, in which he first ap- 
peared in New England, and in which he was 
banished from Massachusetts, had been gradually- 
laid aside. It is probable, that he had not 
wholly ceased from preaching; but, some alter- 
ation having taken place in his views of the 
Christian ministry, and the affairs of the colony 
having almost constantly occupied his attention, 
he seems never to have held, for any length of 
time after his removal to Providence, the office 
of teacher of a church. His family, too, had 
been gradually increased by the births of six 
children, all of whom were now of a tender 
age. In order to provide for the support of 
his family, as well as to repair the fortunes, 
which persecution and sacrifice had impover- 
ished, soon after his return from England he 
erected a trading-house, in the country of the 
Narragansetts, at which he now spent the greater 
part of his time. Here, for many years, he car- 
ried on an honorable traffic with the Indians, 
and, at the same time, instructed them in the 
truths of Christianity, and acted as their advi- 
ser in all their diplomacy with the settlements 
around them. 

He was still, however, regarded as a citizen 
of Providence, and, as such, was successively 
elected to many of the highest offices of the 
town and the colony, and found frequent oc« 



132 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

casions on which to put forth his exertions for 
their welfare. The petty strifes and local feuds, 
which had so long delayed the organization of 
government under the charter, were not wholly 
brought to an end by that event. The causes 
which gave rise to them are long since for- 
gotten, and were, probably, in themselves ex- 
ceedingly trivial and unimportant. The several 
towns of the province, settled as they had been 
mainly by refugees from the other colonies, com- 
prised persons of every form of religious faith, 
and every shade of political opinion. They 
early became the asylum of all sorts of con- 
sciences, so that, as was reproachfully said, if 
a person had lost his conscience, he might be 
sure to find it in some of the towns of Rhode 
Island. Among a population so promiscuously 
collected, it is not strange that some should 
have mistaken the true idea of religious free- 
dom, and extended the shield of conscience over 
matters and opinions with which it had no 
proper connection. The harmony of Providence 
was early disturbed, in this way, by the quarrels 
of troublesome and heady persons, who grew 
restive beneath the wholesome restraints that 
were imposed upon them. From all such strifes, 
however, Mr. Williams appears to have studi- 
ously kept aloof; for his name is seldom men- 
tioned in connection with them, save when he 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 133 

Steps forward to calm the agitated waters, and 
enjoin harmony upon the excited and turbulent 
citizens. His efforts were often crowned with 
success, though he frequently had the mortifi- 
cation of seeing the principles of religious free- 
dom, which, in his own mind, were clearly 
separated from all licentiousness, ridiculously 
perverted to justify the silliest absurdities of 
opinion, or the most irregular extravagances of 
conduct. 

One of the principal difficulties, which, at this 
time, disturbed the peace of the colony, arose 
from the extraordinary proceedings of Mr. Cod- 
dington, the leading inhabitant of the Island of 
Rhode Island. From the very organization of 
the government under the charter, he arrayed 
himself in the opposition, and seems to have 
left no effort untried to overturn and destroy it. 
Uniting with himself a faction composed prob- 
ably of persons accustomed to take their opinions 
from him, he first petitioned the colony of Plym- 
outh to take the island under its jurisdiction ; 
and when this application failed, notwithstand- 
ing he had been elected President, in the mean 
time he went to England, to endeavor to set 
aside the charter which Mr. Williams had pro- 
cured, and destroy the union of the towns, which 
had been organized by its provisions. In this 
endeavor he was successful ; though by what 



134 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

representations he induced the Council of State, 
who then governed the country, so soon i:> an- 
nul the former instrument, has never been clearly 
understood. He returned in 1651, bringing with 
him a commission, erecting the islands of Rhode 
Island and Canonicut into a separate govern- 
ment, and also appointing him Governor, for life, 
of the new colony, with a Council to be nomi- 
nated by the people and approved by himself. 

The arrival of a charier, whose operation would 
inevitably destroy the existing government, and 
clothe a single individual with unwonted power, 
created no ordinary sensation among the towns 
of the province. In Newport and Portsmouth, 
especially, the excitement ran so high as al- 
most to lead to violence, and the opposition, 
which Mr. Coddington encountered in the ex- 
ercise of his new authority, was abundantly suf- 
ficient to show, that the whole proceeding was 
without the sanction, and contrary to the wishes, 
of a majority of the people. The effect of the 
measure, however, was, for a time, to sever the 
islands from the other towns of the colony, and 
to place them under the jurisdiction of a sepa- 
rate government. 

But these internal dissensions were not the 
only troubles to which the Plantations at Provi- 
dence were subjected. The several portions of 
the territory were still subjects of the pressing 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 135 

claims of the other colonies ; and that the little 
republic escaped the partitioning, which has so 
often been the destiny of feeble states, among 
powerful and ambitious neighbors, is to be 
attributed to the firmness and perseverance of 
her citizens, rather than to the forbearance or 
negligence of the colonies that surrounded her. 
Plymouth had at different times laid claim to 
the Island of Rhode Island. Massachusetts still 
asserted her jurisdiction over the people at Paw- 
tuxet; and, soon after the return of Mr. Williams 
from England, she had sent him an order, while 
acting as President of the colony, forbidding him 
to exercise any of the functions of government, 
and alleging that the whole territory was hers, 
by virtue of a charter, which had been grant- 
ed by the Parliament. Though these claims of 
Massachusetts w^ere never allowed within the 
territory either of Providence or of Rhode Isl- 
and, yet she did not fail to exercise her power, 
sometimes in a most despotic way, over the 
citizens of these colonies, whenever they were 
found within her own proper jurisdiction. Among 
the acts of her authorities towards these unof- 
fending assertors of the freedom of conscience, 
the following are of so tyrannical a nature, as 
to remind the reader of the dark deeds record- 
ed of the inquisition, in countries on which the 
light of the reformation has never shone 



136 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

The Reverend John Clarke, Mr. Obadiah 
Holmes, and Mr. John Crandall, three citizens 
of Newport, were appointed, by the church at 
that place, to visit one William Witter, a mem- 
ber of that church, then resident at Lynn, who, 
on account of his great age, had requested a 
visit from his brethren, for the purpose of Chris- 
tian intercourse and improvement. They pro- 
ceeded in a peaceable manner, like Christian 
men, on this benevolent mission, and arrived at 
the house of Mr. Witter on Saturday. The 
next day being the Sabbath, Mr. Clarke was 
invited to preach at the house to the members 
of the family, and such of the neighbors as might 
chance to come in. While he was speaking 
from some text of the Bible relating to tempta- 
tion, he was suddenly interrupted by the ap- 
pearance of two constables, who silenced his 
preaching, and arrested him and his companions, 
by virtue of the following order, signed by one 
of the magistrates, viz. 

" By virtue hereof, you are required to go to 
the house of William Witter, and so to search 
from house to house for certain erroneous persons, 
being strangers, and them to apprehend, and in 
safe custody to Iceep, and to-morrow morning, at 
eight 0^ clock, to bring before me.'' 

They were detained, through the Sabbath, in 



ROGER V/ILLIAMS. 137 

the custody of the officers, and on the following 
day were sent to Boston by the magistrate, and 
committed to prison. On being brought before 
the Court for trial, they were defended by Mr. 
Clarke, in a speech which not a little puzzled 
the Massachusetts magistrates, with the dilem- 
mas which it proposed. " At length, however," 
says Mr. Clarke, " the Governor stepped up, and 
told us we had denied infant baptism, and, 
being somewhat transported, told me I had de- 
served death, and said he would not have such 
trash brought into their jurisdiction." 

The trial resulted, as was to be expected, in 
the conviction of the prisoners, and they were 
sentenced by the Court to pay a fine, Mr. 
Clarke of twenty pounds, Mr. Holmes of thirty 
pounds, and Mr. Crandall of five pounds, or, 
in case of their refusal of payment, to be whipped. 
The fines they of course refused to pay, as they 
acknowledged neither the justice of the sentence 
nor the jurisdiction of the Court. They were ac- 
cordingly remanded to prison, from which, after a 
few weeks, Mr. Clarke and Mr. Crandall, by the 
interposition of their friends, were set at liberty, 
and suffered to return to Newport. Mr. Holmes 
was detained longer, and at length, before being 
discharged, was whipped with thirty lashes upon 
his back, inflicted with unusual severity. 



138 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

Proceedings like these, of which the early 
annals of Massachusetts furnish a melancholy list 
of examples, can be fully explained only by re- 
minding the reader, that the victims of this in- 
quisitorial power were regarded as heretics, and 
that, in the estimation of the Puritans of that 
colony, heresy was a crime before which every 
civil offence faded into comparative insignifi- 
cance.* Mr. Clarke and his companions were 
Baptists, the disciples of a sect, which the fa- 
thers of Massachusetts had seen rapidly increas- 
ing among the people of the colony, in spite 
of the severe laws which they had promulgated 
against its tenets and its worship. These peo- 
ple had always been fostered in Rhode Island ; 
and now, that any of their ministers had ven- 
tured to set up their persecuted worship on the 
soil of the Puritan commonwealth, though within 
the sanctuary of a private dwelling, and even 
without proclaiming any of their peculiar tenets, 
they were punished with the utmost rigors of 
the law. Two other persons also, who were 
present at the punishment of Mr. Holmes, and 
who expressed some sympathy with his suffer- 
ings, and admiration of the spirit with which he 
endured them, were immediately arrested by the 

* For an account of these transactions, see Backus's 
History of J\l'ew England, Vol. I. p. 207. 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 139 

officers, and, when brought before the Court, were 
sentenced to a fine and imprisonment. 

It would have been difficult for the author- 
ities of Massachusetts to point out the par- 
ticular law, which had been violated in either 
of these instances, in any of its hteral provisions. 
It was enough for them, that the spirit of the 
whole legislation of the colony was opposed to 
heresy, and that the ministers sanctioned and 
commended all their measures for its suppression. 
Such was the zeal of the people, at that time, 
for defending the Puritan faith, that, when here- 
tics were to be punished, the Court did not 
scruple to disregard all limits to their authority, 
and to overleap the bounds of their jurisdiction. 

In this condition of the affiiirs of the colony, 
while the citizens were at variance with each 
other, and were subjected, without redress, to 
every species of tyranny and indignity, which 
their neighbors of Massachusetts chose to prac- 
tise upon them, it was obvious to all that their 
only safety was to be found in maintaining the 
union of the towns, which had been formed un- 
der the charter of Mr. Williams. Amidst the 
conflicting claims, which the other colonies had 
interposed, it was clear that neither of the sec- 
tions into which the province had been divided 
could long maintain an independent existence 
The Indians also, taking advantage of the dis- 



140 



AIMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 



sensions of the colonists, began to commit dep- 
redations, which the commissioners of the United 
Colonies were unwilling to prevent, and which 
the several towns were loo feeble to punish. 

The inhabitants of the islands in the bay, 
who had formerly opposed the measures of Mr. 
Coddington, now dreaded the prospect of being 
subjected to his power. His sympathies seem 
to have strongly inclined to the regal side of the 
great question, which then agitated the British 
empire, while those of the great body of the 
people had always been with the Parliament. 
And it is highly probable, that they entertained 
serious apprehensions that the administration of 
the new Governor, who owed his elevation not 
to the suffrages of the colony, but to the power 
of the Council in England, might prove unfa- 
vorable to popular rights and privileges. Their 
only hope, therefore, plainly lay in an appeal to 
the Council of State for the abrogation of Mr. 
Coddington' s commission, and the restoration of 
the charter, which had been granted to Mr. Wil- 
liams. With a full impression of these views, 
and very soon after the events which we have 
narrated above had occurred, nearly all the in- 
habitants of Newport, and a large number of 
those of Portsmouth, united in an attempt to ac- 
complish this most desirable object, on which 
the very existence of their settlements seemed 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 141 

to depend. They appointed Mr. John Clarke 
to proceed as their agent to England, and rep- 
resent their condition to the Council, which then 
governed the country. The appointment was in 
every way a most fortunate one. He was a 
man of liberal education, and bland and courtly 
manners, and was fully acquainted with the af- 
fairs of the people he was appointed to repre- 
sent, having resided among them for many years 
as a physician, and as a minister of the church 
at Newport. 

At about the same time, and influenced doubt- 
less by nearly the same considerations, the two 
towns of Providence and Warwick, which had 
still continued to maintain the government under 
the original charter, made proposals to Mr. Wil- 
liams again to cross the Atlantic, and cooperate 
with Mr. Clarke, for the purpose of procuring 
the interposition of the Council in adjusting 
the difficulties, which had sprung up in the col- 
ony. These proposals he at first absolutely de- 
clined, though not from any diminution of his 
interest in the colony, but from reluctance again 
to leave his family, and his inability to incur 
the expense of so great an undertaking. It may 
be, too, that he was influenced by his former 
experience of the thankless nature of services 
rendered to the state, and called to mind the 
meagre and reluctant remuneration he had re- 



142 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

ceived for his labors and expenditures in pro- 
curing the charter. 

Such, however, were the importunities of the 
citizens, and such his own patriotic interest in 
the colony, over whose growth he had watched 
with parental care, that he at length accepted 
the appointment which was conferred upon him, 
and prepared again to embark for the shores 
of England. Some effort was made, among the 
inhabitants of the towns, to raise the funds ne- 
cessary for defraying the expenses of the voy- 
age. The measures which were devised, howev- 
er, do not appear to have been effectual, for the 
adequate sum was not provided, and he was 
obliged to sell his trading-house in Narragansett, 
in order to obtain the means of making the 
voyage, and of supporting his family during his 
absence. In this act, which seems to have been 
the offspring of pure necessity, he not only re- 
linquished the profits of the lucrative traffic he 
had been carrying on, amounting, as he says, to 
a hundred pounds per annum, but he also 
parted with what must have been his chief de- 
pendence for the livelihood of himself and his 
family. It is only when we thus consider the 
circumstances in which he was placed, that he 
was a husband and a father, surrounded by a 
large family, whose immediate wants he must 
supply, and for whose education and future well- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 143 

being he must make provision, that we can 
fully appreciate the disinterested spirit that im- 
pelled him to the sacrifices he made, and the 
labors he performed. It led him to disregard 
the limits of a narrow prudence, and to turn a 
deaf ear to the suggestions of mere personal 
interest, whenever an opportunity was presented 
of benefiting the colony he had founded, or of 
advancing the great principle for which he had 
contended and suffered. 

At length, having completed the requisite 
preparations for his long absence from home, he 
joined Mr. Clarke at Boston, where they em- 
barked together in November, 1651. It was not 
without considerable molestation and embarrass- 
ment from the authorities and people of Mas- 
sachusetts, that Mr. Williams was allowed to 
pass through their territory for the purpose of 
taking ship for England. He alludes to these 
in his subsequent letters, though he furnishes 
us no means of judging of their nature or op- 
eration. Though no longer in any degree able 
either to harm the orthodoxy or disturb the 
peace of the colony, yet the authorities were 
opposed to the objects of his mission, and, it 
may be, dreaded the representations, which the 
envoys from Rhode Island had it in their pow- 
er to make to the government of the mother 
country of the condition of New England. Taci- 



144 A xAl E R I C A N BIOGRAPHY. 

tus, the great historian of the worst ages of the 
Roman repubhc, has remarked it as a principle 
of human nature, that we hate those whom we 
have injured ; and the treatment which Roger 
Wilhams, while living, and which his memory, 
after he was dead, received from the colony 
that banished him, would seem to furnish some 
corroboration of the justness of the remark. 



CHAPTER XII. 

State of public Affairs in England. — Williams's 
Occupations while there. — Coddington^s Com- 
mission revoked. — Letter of the General As- 
sembly to Williams. — His Intercourse with Sir 
Henry Vane, Cromtvell, and Milton, — His 
literary Labors. — His Return to Providence. 
— Reorganization of the Government. — He 
is elected President of the Colony. 

We now find Mr. Williams a second time 
in England, in the service of the colony at 
Providence. The mother country was still in 
the midst of the momentous revolution, which 
had already commenced when he last visited 
her shores. The interval had been marked by 



ROGER WILLIAMo. 145 

great events. The King, Charles the First, had 
been brought to the scaffold ; the monarchy, the 
peerage, and the connection of the church with 
the government, had been abolished by law ; and 
the Long Parliament, through its Council of 
State, ruled the realm of England. During the 
period of his residence there, another change, 
perhaps still more extraordinary, was added to 
those with which the age was crowded. Crom- 
well, impelled, it may be, by considerations of 
state necessity, as well as by motives of per- 
sonal ambition, forcibly dissolved the Parliament, 
and from the ruins of the monarchy erected 
for himself a throne of even more than kingly 
power. The public mind was agitated to an 
unwonted degree by these astonishing changes ; 
new theories of government were broached, and, 
as never fails to happen in these transition 
states of the social system, tumults and fac- 
tions distracted the nation. 

Of the events that marked the period, Roger 
Williams was no indifferent spectator ; and we 
have reason to regret, that no other memorials 
have been preserved of his residence in Eng- 
land, than such as may be gleaned from the 
incidental allusions contained in the letters he 
wrote to his friends in America. These, though 
few in number, are yet sufficient to show that 
he was intimately acquainted with many of the 

VOL. IV. 10 



146 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

leading personages of the time, and must have 
been cognizant of much of its secret history, 
and the hidden springs of its stirring events. 
Soon after their arrival in England, Mr. Wil- 
liams and Mr. Clarke presented a petition to 
the Council of State, in behalf of the colony 
they had come to represent. This was referred 
to a committee on foreign affairs for investiga- 
tion and final decision. The envoys of Rhode 
Island encountered a strong opposition, in the 
prosecution of their objects, from some of the 
members of Parliament, from many of the min- 
isters of both the Presbyterian and Independ- 
ent churches, and other influential persons, most 
of whom were in the interest of the other colo- 
nies of New England. But they found an effi- 
cient and unwavering coadjutor in Sir Henry 
Vane, whose spirit and principles were kindred 
with those of Roger Williams, and who had 
early befriended the colony which he had found- 
ed as an asylum for the persecuted assertors of 
religious freedom. He was at this time at the 
height of his influence as a statesman, and in 
the full splendor of his prosperity. He was a 
prominent member of the Council, of which he 
had been chosen President, and held the high 
office of Treasurer and Commissioner of the 
Navy, in the exercise of which he administered 
nearly the whole foreign affairs of the common 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 147 

wealth. And, more than all, in an age of fanat- 
icism and revolution, when the wildest opinions 
were asserted, and the most reckless conduct 
justified, he was ever the fearless, unwavering 
advocate of regulated hberty, and the consist- 
ent, though earnest and enthusiastic exemplar 
of simple-hearted piety. 

In the mean time, however, while the question 
was still pending, an order was passed by the 
Council of State vacating Mr. Coddington's com- 
mission, and confirming the charter which had 
formerly been granted to the colony, until a 
final adjudication of the case could be had. 
This measure, so favorable, and so full of prom- 
ise to the interests he was seeking to promote, 
Mr. Williams, in his letter to the towns of Prov- 
idence and Warwick, ascribes to the mediation 
of Sir Henry Vane with the Council, and speaks 
of him as, " under God, the sheet anchor of our 
ship." The order of the Council was brought 
to Newport in the early part of the year 1653, 
and contained directions to the several Planta- 
tions immediately to unite themselves again un- 
der the common government of the charter, as 
they had been before any obstruction to its au- 
thority had arisen. Such, however, were now 
the jealousies which had sprung up anew during 
the separation of the colony, that the order was 
not obeyed ; and, though Mr. Coddington's rule 



148 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

seems to have been brought to an end, yet the 
settlements on the island, and those on the main 
land, continued for a year and a half to main- 
tain their separate governments. 

Mr. Williams, with his associate, still remained 
in England, to watch the progress of events, and 
sustain the petition they had presented to the 
Council. The final adjustment of the claims of 
the colony was delayed in part by the war be- 
tween England and Holland, which then en- 
grossed the attention of the government, and 
also by the determined opposition which these 
claims encountered from the agents and influen- 
tial friends of the other New England colonies. 
The two parties stood in the Parliament, and 
before the Council, according to the represen- 
tation of Williams, " as two armies, ready to 
engage, observing the motions and postures each 
of the other, and yet shy of each other." Dur- 
ing the absence of Mr. WiUiams, at a meeting 
of the General Assembly, held at Providence, 
a letter was addressed to him, expressing the 
thanks of the Assembly for his '' care and dil- 
igence " in promoting the interests of the colony, 
and presenting their opinion, that, in case the 
charter should be finally renewed, " it might 
tend much to the weighing of men's minds, 
and subjecting of persons who have been re- 
fractory to yield themselves over as unto a set- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 149 

tied government, if it might be the pleasure of 
the honorable State to invest, appoint, and em- 
power himself to come over as Governor of the 
colony, for the space of one year." An inti- 
mation like this, coming from men who had al- 
ways been distinguished for their jealousy of 
every form of delegated power, was indeed re- 
markable, and conveys a strong expression of 
their confidence in his integrity, and their high 
appreciation of his services. His own wisdom, 
also, and the disinterested principles on which 
he acted, are not less strikingly illustrated in 
the fact, that he entirely disregarded so flatter- 
ing a temptation to the acquisition of political 
power. The letters which he wrote to his towns- 
men while absent contain no aspirations for 
self-aggrandizement. The only solicitudes they 
express are for the welfare of his family, and 
the harmony and prosperity of the colony ; 
and his most frequent admonitions were, '' that 
no private respects, or gains, or quarrels, may 
cause them to neglect the public and common 
safety, peace, and liberties." 

The character of Mr. Williams, and his po- 
sition while in England, would naturally throw 
him into the society of some of the most dis- 
tinguished men of the time. He spent a num- 
ber of weeks at Belleau, the beautiful estate of 
Sir Henry Vane, in Lincolnshire, where he doubt- 



150 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

less often mingled in that company of kindred 
minds, who used so frequently to assemble to 
discuss, with their illustrious leader, the deep 
questions of theology, or to devise plans for the 
happiness and security of the periled and dis- 
tracted commonwealth. He was in habits of 
intimate association with Cromwell, who dis- 
cussed with him the affairs of the state, and 
drew forth from him his views of the Indians, 
and his singular adventures among them, in the 
wilds of New England ; with Harrison, the Ma- 
jor-General of the army ; with Lawrence, the 
Lord President of the Council of State; and with 
many others in Parliament, and at the helm of 
public affairs. He also formed an intimate ac- 
quaintance with Milton, who was then Latin 
Secretary to the Council, and already rapidly 
rising to the zenith of his renown as a states- 
man and a poet. The Paradise Lost had not 
yet been written; but the republican bard had 
sung many of his sweetest sonnets, and had 
published in prose some of those noble vindi- 
cations of liberty, '' of which all Europe rang 
from side to side." Younger than Williams by 
more than nine years, he was now in the fresh- 
ness of early manhood, and the full vigor of 
his great powers. The infirmities and disasters 
of his later life had not yet darkened the hopes 
or damped the ardor of his spirit. In their fre 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 151 

quent companionship, with the interchange of 
congenial views, and the expression of common 
principles and aims, they appear to have min- 
gled the study of languages and literature ; and 
for the Dutch, which the poet acquired from 
the teachings of Williams, he opened, in return, 
the rich stores of his varied learning in many 
different tongues. In these high associations, 
and in the familiar conversations to which they 
naturally gave rise, he would, doubtless, often 
recur to his favorite themes, the inalienable free- 
dom of the conscience, and the separation of 
religion from the civil power ; and the free dec- 
laration of his opinions, and the simple narra- 
tive of his sufferings, must have exerted an 
important influence upon the eminent men in 
whose society he mingled, an influence, indeed, 
which history cannot now very distincdy trace, 
but which may have produced its results in the 
liberal policy of the Protector, and the lessons 
of toleration, which he enjoined upon the colo- 
nies in New England. 

In dwelling upon these scenes and incidents 
of Mr. Williams's residence in England, one can- 
not fail to be reminded of the contrasts they 
present to the humble life he had so recently 
left. Yet, in this society of scholars and states- 
men, with whose brilliant fortunes he might easily 
have identified his own, he did not forget the 



152 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

colony with whose interests he was charged. 
His spirit was not elated, nor was his attention 
ever diverted from the objects he had left his 
home to accomplish. In order to obtain a live- 
lihood while engaged in their prosecution, he de- 
voted a portion of his time to the instruction of 
some young gentlemen in the languages, prob- 
ably the sons of his friends, who, from a respect 
for his character, and a desire to aid his fortunes, 
furnished him with this occupation for his leisure 
hours. And it deserves to be mentioned, as a 
proof of his extensive scholarship, that he thus 
taught the Hebrew, Greek, Latin, French, and 
Dutch, some of them at least, " not by grammar 
rules," but, as he says himself, by words, phrases, 
and constant talk, us we teach our children Eng- 
lish. He was also engaged in some philanthropic 
labors undertaken for the benefit of the poor in 
London, who had been reduced to the extremity 
of suffering by the civil wars, which then dis- 
turbed the nation. 

The labors in the mining districts had been 
stopped amidst the tumults of the times, and the 
price of coals and every species of fuel had be- 
come so high, in the metropolis, as to place it 
utterly beyond the reach of the poorer classes 
of the people, who gave vent to their despera- 
tion in every kind of pillage and conflagration. 
The sympathies of Mr. Williams were excited 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 153 

by their niiserable condition, and he appears 
to have enUsted his personal services in the 
execution of the plans, which were devised for 
alleviating their sufferings and quieting their 
discontents. It was also during the same period, 
the winter of 1652, and while thus engaged in 
the service of the city and the Parliament, that 
he found leisure to prepare for the press, and 
to publish, his rejoinder to Mr. Cotton's answer 
to his " Bloody Tenet of Persecution," which he 
entitled " The Bloody Tenet yet more bloody 
by Mr. Cotton's Endeavor to wash it white." 
At about the same time, he also published his 
" Hireling Ministry none of Christ's ; or, a Dis- 
course touching the propagating the Gospel of 
Jesus Christ," and his *' Experiments of Spiritual 
Life and Health, and their Preservatives," two 
essays, mainly of a controversial character, relat- 
ing to the questions of theology and church gov- 
ernment, at that time so much discussed both in 
England and the colonies. 

Early in the summer of 1654, Mr. Williams 
returned to Providence. The final determina- 
tion of the question pertaining to the renewal 
of the charter had not yet been accomplished ; 
but the accounts which he received of dis- 
agreements and troubles in the colony, together 
with the unprotected condition of his family, 
and the great expensiveness of a residence in 



154 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

England, induced him to leave the remainder of 
the business in the hands of Mr. Clarke, and 
return to his turbulent and excited fellow-citi- 
zens, that, if possible, he might harmonize their 
differences, and establish the government he had 
labored so assiduously in instituting. He bore 
with him an order from the Lord Protector's 
Council, addressed to the authorities of Massa- 
chusetts, and requiring them to allow him, in 
future, either to land or to embark within their 
jurisdiction, without being molested. The order 
was obeyed, on his landing at Boston, by the 
Governor, Mr. Bellingham, under his own hand ; 
but it was not till two years after, and then 
at his own repeated solicitation, that it was 
formally acknowledged by the General Court, and 
entered upon the records of the colony. 

On his arrival at Providence, and his return 
to the bosom of his family, the first object 
which engaged his attention was the restoration 
of union among the several towns of the colony, 
and the reorganization of the government, in ac- 
cordance with the order of the Council of State, 
passed two years before. To accomplish this, 
he soon perceived, was an undertaking of no 
common difficulty. Jealousies and feuds, grown 
inveterate by the lapse of time, still separated 
the towns from each other, and distracted the 
citizens among themselves. So predominant had 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 155 

this narrow and selfish spirit become, among the 
people of Providence, that they seemed willing 
to forego, for the sake of its petty gratification, 
the whole advantage of colonial union, and even 
to call in question the disinterestedness and the 
value of the services, which Mr. Williams and 
his associate had rendered by their agency in 
England. Returning thus to a people, many 
of whom were too ignorant or too prejudiced 
to appreciate the blessings they enjoyed, it was 
not strange that he felt wounded at their un- 
grateful requital of his sacrifices, and seemed to 
himself to have been laboring in vain wOiile en- 
gaged in their service. 

Impressed with these considerations, very soon 
after his return, he addressed a calm and con- 
ciliatory letter to the citizens of Providence, in 
which he recounts with modesty, yet with great 
dignity and firmness, the sacrifices he had made 
in their behalf, for which he had " reaped nothing 
but grief, and sorrow, and bitterness." He la- 
ments, in earnest and pathetic language, the dis- 
tractions of the colony, points out the perversi- 
ties of temper in which they had their origin, 
and urges the citizens to bury their animosities, 
and unite themselves again in establishing the 
only government under which they could hope 
to maintain an independent existence. He also 



156 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

presented to the town a letter from Sir Henry 
Vane, addressed to the inhabitants of the colony 
of Rhode Island, which he had brought with him 
from England. In this letter, the generous- 
minded writer mildly reproaches the colonists 
with their " headiness, tumults, disorders, and in- 
justice, of which," says he, ^' the noise echoes into 
the ears of all, as well friends as enemies, by 
every return of ships from those parts," and 
strongly urges upon them the appointment of 
commissioners, in behalf of the several interests, 
that they thus " might put a stop to their grow- 
ing breaches and distractions, silence their ene- 
mies, encourage their friends, and honor the 
name of God." 

Persuasives like these, coming from the best 
friends of the colony, did not fail to produce a 
salutary effect upon the minds of the people of 
Providence. A meeting of the town was soon 
after held, at which commissioners were appoint- 
ed to meet with those, who should be appointed 
from the other towns, for the purpose of re- 
organizing the government of the province. This 
conciliatory example was immediately followed 
by the three remaining towns, in which were 
appointed commissioners for the reunion of the 
colony. At length, on the 31st of August, 
1654, a meeting of the commissioners of all the 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 151 

towns was held, and the articles of union finally 
agreed upon. All laws, which had been enacted 
before the separation of the colony, were to re- 
main in force until repealed by the legislature, 
and all local ordinances, which had been adopted 
by either portion of the colony, during the period 
of the separation, were still to be binding upon 
those who adopted them, so long as they should 
desire it. 

Mr. Williams was also appointed, by the citi- 
zens of Providence, to prepare an answer, in 
behalf of the town, to the letter which Sir Henry 
Vane had addressed to the people of the colony. 
This service he readily undertook, and the ad- 
mirable letter which he wrote has been pre- 
served in the records of the town, bearing the 
date of August 2Tth, 1654. It breathes the 
spirit of elevated and generous patriotism, and 
was fitted not only to gratify and honor the 
person to whom it was addressed, but also to 
subdue the mutual resentments, and unite the 
discordant opinions, of those in whose name it 
was sent. Commencing with an expression of 
regret, on account of the recent retirement 
of Sir Henry from the councils of the com- 
monwealth, he speaks of his " loving lines " to 
the colony, as "■ the sweet fruits of his rest ; " 
"as when the sun retires his brightness from 



158 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

the world, yet from under the clouds we per- 
ceive his presence, and enjoy his light, and heat, 
and sweet refreshing." He then proceeds to 
narrate the history of the troubles which had 
distracted the colony, points out the causes from 
which they sprang, and sets forth, in glowing 
terms, the blessings which the colonists have 
enjoyed, inasmuch as " they have drunk of the 
cup of as great liberties as any people under 
the whole heaven." The letter concludes with 
the earnest assurance, that the heart of their 
friend shall no more be saddened by their di- 
visions and disorders, and, in the name of the 
whole colony, utters the hope " that, when we 
are gone and rotten, our posterity and children 
after us shall read, in our town records, your 
pious and favorable letters, and loving kindness 
to us, and this our answer, and real endeavor 
after peace and righteousness." 

The first general election after the reorgan 
ization of the government was held at Warwick, 
on the 12th of September, at which Mr. Wil- 
liams was chosen President of the colony. At 
the same meeting of the citizens of the several 
towns, he v/as also appointed, in behalf of the 
whole colony, in connection with Mr. Gregory 
Dexter, to draw up and send ^' letters of humble 
thanksgiving" to his Highness the Lord Pro- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 159 

tector, Sir Henry Vane, Mr. Holland, and Mr. 
John Clarke, all which he was requested to sign 
and seal in virtue of his office as President. 

Thus was terminated the unhappy division of 
the settlements of Rhode Island ; a division, 
which had extended through several years, and 
had nearly destroyed the independent existence 
of the colony. The auspicious union of the long- 
separated towns was evidently brought about 
mainly through the judicious and well-directed 
efforts of Mr. Williams. He had identified him- 
self with the interests of the people among 
whom his lot was cast, and in their service he 
allowed no difficulties to daunt him, no ingrati- 
tude or folly to dishearten him. He succeeded 
in his exertions when most men would have 
been borne down by the opposition he met, or 
would have turned away in disgust with the 
narrow views and perverse tempers of those by 
whom he was surrounded. 



160 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

Character of his Administration. — He acts as 
Mediator between the United Colonies and the 
Indians. — Spirit of Disorder in the Colony. 

— Williams's Letter to the Toivn of Provi- 
dence. — Conduct of William Harris. — Wil- 
liams attempts to conciliate the other Colonies. 

— Their Efforts to compel Rhode Island to 
persecute the Quakers. — Her liberal Policy 

towards them. 

The administration of Mr. Williams, as Presi- 
dent of the colony, lasted for two years and a 
half, and was marked by many important inci- 
dents, I though the scanty records of the times 
now afford but imperfect means for their illus- 
tration. The office which he' held was at that 
time encompassed with more than ordinary dif- 
ficulty and perplexity. The people of the several 
towns had, indeed, united themselves under a 
common jurisdiction ; yet the public sentiment of 
the colony was still in an unsettled state, and 
its civil affairs were in such a condition as to 
render them most difficult of management. The 
government, which had been adopted under the 
provisions of the charter, had, from the begin- 
ning, been wanting in efficiency, and had proved 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 161 

itself, in many respects, inadequate to the ex- 
igencies even of an infant society. The towns 
were severally too independent of each other, 
were bound together by too feeble ties, and pos- 
sessed too many checks upon the colonial As- 
sembly, readily to make those sacrifices of local 
interest, which the general good always demands. 
The colony had just emerged from a protracted 
strife, in which it had been almost annihilated, 
and there were then no established usages to 
control the habits of the people, to mark the 
limits of authority, or regulate the manner in 
which it should be exercised. The citizens, too, 
were singularly and often ridiculously jealous of 
every demonstration of official power, and were 
too much disposed to set up their own personal 
wills against the action of the constituted au- 
thorities. A mistaken idea of freedom of con- 
science had taken possession of many of their 
minds, and was adding its aid to native ob- 
stinacy and the spirit of faction, in producing 
results, both of opinion and conduct, disastrous 
to the peace and harmony of the colony. 

The manner in which Mr. Williams admin- 
istered the office of President, in this troubled 
state of public affairs, well illustrates . his char- 
acter, and furnishes a practical commentary upon 
his views of civil government, which have been 
so often misunderstood and misrepresented. He 

VOL. IV. II 



162 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

was both conciliatory and firm ; inclined to hu- 
mor the prejudices of the people, so far as they 
were harmless, but never to sacrifice to their 
clamors any real interest of the community, or 
to shrink from the performance of any official 
duty, however much opposed to their will. His 
acts as a magistrate were commended to the 
colonists by the influence of his personal char- 
acter, and the services he had rendered the state, 
so that his authority was seldom resisted or 
called in question, even amidst "the headiness 
and tumults " by which he was surrounded. 

Soon after entering upon the duties of his 
presidency, an opportunity was presented for 
him again to interpose his kind offices in behalf 
of the Indians, whose interests and relations to 
the New England colonies never failed to oc- 
cupy a considerable share of his attention. 
There was a prospect of hostilities again spring- 
ing up between the United Colonies and some 
of the neighboring tribes, and he aimed to put 
a stop to the rising feud, and scatter the gather- 
ing clouds of war. For this purpose, he ad- 
dressed a letter to the General Assembly of 
Massachusetts, in which he ''humbly prays their 
consideration, whether it be not only possible, but 
very easy, to live and die in peace with all the 
natives of this country." He urges upon them a 
pacific policy, as the only one becoming a 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 163 

Christian state, by appealing to their gratitude 
to the Indians, who had received them, and given 
them land, w^hen their own countrymen had 
driven them away ; to their regard for the honor 
of God, whose power had been displayed in the 
conversion of so many Indians to the Christian 
faith ; to their horror of the sore calamities of 
war, and their veneration for the bright examples 
of peace, presented in the sacred Scriptures. 
Massachusetts, with a spirit that does honor to 
her early fathers, declared herself against the 
war, although it had been already determined on 
by the commissioners of the United Colonies, and 
the troops who had marched against the In- 
dians returned to their homes, after a bloodless 
though by no means dishonorable campaign. *= 

During the early part of the presidency of 
Mr. Williams, one of the restless spirits, of whom 
so many were at this time congregated in Rhode 
Island, busied himself in circulating, among the 
citizens of Providence, a seditious tract against 
the authority of civil government, and maintain- 
ing that it was " contrary to the rule of the 
gospel to execute judgment upon transgressors 
against the private or public weal." This doc- 
trine, springing up so naturally beneath the un- 
restricted freedom of opinion, which was then 

* Hutchinson, Vol. I. p. 187. 



164 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY 

enjoyed, was obviously, in its tendency, destruc- 
tive of the very ends of society ; yet, in the un- 
settled state of the colony, it vi^as sure to find 
advocates and followers, some of whom, perhaps, 
might think it sanctioned by the principles of 
Roger Williams himself. Indeed, he was evi- 
dently inclined to the maxim, " the world is gov- 
erned too much ; " and his views of civil liberty 
would undoubtedly lead him to allow to every 
citizen the utmost degree of personal freedom, 
consistent with the order and well-being of so- 
ciety. 

But of this freedom he perfectly understood 
the nature, and clearly distinguished the bound- 
ary line, which separates it from every form of 
licentiousness. Accordingly, when a doctrine so 
fatal to its true interests was avowed in the col- 
ony, he immediately set the whole weight of his 
influence and his authority to oppose it. Though 
holding the highest office to which the suffi-ages 
of the people could raise him, he did not wait 
to study the popular will, but boldly declared 
his abhorrence of ''such infinite liberty of con- 
science," as was thus attempted to be set up. 
He addressed a letter to the town, setting forth 
the principles on which the state was founded, 
and denying, in the most explicit manner, that 
he had ever given the slightest sanction to these 
doctrines of lawless license. The letter itself is 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 165 

a sufficient vindication of his fame from every 
suspicion of radicalism, and is, at the same time, 
an exposition of the doctrine of freedom of con- 
science, so full and so explicit as to leave nothing 
further to be desired for its illustration. The 
following is the letter as it is quoted by Mr. 
Knowles from the records of Providence. 

" That I should ever speak or write a tittle, 
that tends to such infinite liberty of conscience, 
is a mistake, which I have ever disclaimed and 
abhorred. To prevent such mistakes, I at pres- 
ent shall only propose this case ; There goes 
many a ship to sea, with many hundred souls 
in one ship, whose weal and woe is common, 
and is a true picture of a commonwealth, or 
a human combination or society. It hath fallen 
out sometimes, that both Papists and Protestants, 
Jews and Turks, may be embarked in one ship ; 
upon which supposal, I affirm that all the liberty 
of conscience, that ever I pleaded for, turns upon 
these two hinges; that none of the Papists, 
Protestdnts, Jews, or Turks, be forced to come 
to the ship's prayers or worship, or compelled 
from their own particular prayers or worship, if 
they practise any. I further add, that I never 
denied, that, notwithstanding this liberty, the com- 
mander of this ship ought to command the ship's 
course, yea, and also command that justice, 
peace, and sobriety be kept, and practised, both 



166 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

among the seamen and all the passengers. If 
any of the seamen refuse to perform their ser- 
vice, or passengers to pay their freight; if any 
refuse to help, in person or purse, towards the 
common charges or defence ; if any refuse to 
obey the common laws and orders of the ship, 
concerning their common peace or preservation ; 
if any shall mutiny and rise up against their 
commanders and officers ; if any shall preach 
or write that there ought to be no commanders 
or officers, because all are equal in Christ, 
therefore no masters or officers, no laws nor 
orders, no corrections nor punishments ; I say, 
I never denied, but in such cases, w^hatever is 
pretended, the commander or commanders may 
judge, resist, compel, and punish such trans- 
gressors, according to their deserts and merits. 
This, if seriously and honestly minded, may, if 
it so please the Father of Lights, let in some 
light to such as willingly shut not their eyes." 
This letter of Mr. Williams, full and explicit 
as it is respecting the authority of government 
and the duty of citizens, did not entirely erad- 
icate the impracticable and absurd notions of 
individual freedom, which were propagated by 
the turbulent spirits, that infested the colony. 
It is plain, that the principles of religious .ib- 
erty were very imperfectly understood among the 
people at large, and that its name was con- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 167 

stantly liable to be used, among those who were 
impatient of restraint, as a pretext for their ob- 
stinate adherence to the absurd doctrines they 
had embraced. 

The most troublesome manifestation of this 
spirit was found in the proceedings of William 
Harris, an influential inhabitant of Providence, 
who attempted to inflame the minds of the peo- 
ple a second time towards the constituted au- 
thorities, by sending to all the towns of the 
colony a violent and exciting pamphlet, which 
is described, in the language of Roger Williams, 
as being " against all earthly powers, Parliaments, 
laws, charters, magistrates, prisons, punishments, 
rates, yea, and against all Kings and Princes." * 
He subsequently declared, at a general meeting 
of the colony, that he was ready to maintain 
these doctrines with his blood. What action 
was taken by the magistrates of the colony, in 
relation to this extraordinary movement on the 
part of a leading citizen, cannot now be very 
clearly determined. It is plain, however, that 
Mr. Williams regarded it as partaking of the 
nature of treason against the authorities of Eng- 
land, as well as against those of the colony. 

A letter, which he received from Crom- 

* George Fox digged out of his Burro wes. Boston 
1676. p. 20. 



168 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

well soon after this affair, addressed to the 
" President, Assistants and Inhabitants of Rhode 
Island," directing them to take care of the 
peace and safety of the plantations, that there 
arise no detriment or dishonor to their common- 
wealth or themselves, served greatly to strengthen 
his authority, and to increase the respect of the 
people for the government. The General As- 
sembly, in pursuance of the advice contained in 
the Protector's letter, immediately passed an act, 
declaring, that, " if any person or persons be found, 
by the examination and judgment of the General 
Court of Commissioners, to be a ringleader or 
ringleaders of factions or divisions among us, 
he or they shall be sent over, at his or their 
own charges, as prisoners, to receive his or their 
trial or sentence, at the pleasure of his High- 
ness and the Lords of his Council." This ju- 
dicious and timely action of the legislature, 
founded, as it was, on the recommendation of 
the Protector, exerted a salutary influence in 
promoting peace and good order among the 
people of the colony. Quiet reigned once more 
among the settlements. Mr. Harris, with others of 
the leading agitators, who had never been at rest 
since the restoration ol the charter, were sub- 
dued by the prompt and resolute stand thus 
taken by the authorities, and gave in their al- 
legiance to the colony, and cried up government 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 169 

and magistrates as much as they had cried them 
down before. 

This quiet, however, was only temporary. Mr. 
Harris, whose mind seems to have been in- 
herently prone to the wildest extremes, did not 
utterly abandon the disorganizing doctrines he 
had formerly avowed. He repressed them for 
a time, but soon began to publish them again, 
probably with still greater peril to the peace 
and good order of the state ; so that Mr. Wil- 
liams, near the close of his presidency, entered 
a formal complaint against him, at the Gen- 
eral Court of Commissioners, for high treason 
against the commonwealth. The seditious pam- 
phlet was read in the hearing of the Court, 
together with Mr. Williams's accusation and Mr. 
Harris's reply, and the Court decided that he 
was guilty of maintaining, in substance, that any 
one who can say, "it is his conscience, ought 
not to yield subjection to any human order 
amongst men." The question whether this really 
amounted to treason, was very properly referred 
to the judgment of the authorities in the moth- 
er country, and the offender, in the mean time, 
was bound " in good bonds to his good behavior 
until their sentence be known." 

These proceedings, sanctioned, as they were, 
by many of the principal citizens, seem to have 
alienated Mr. Harris from the interests of Prov- 



170 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

idence, and to have been the commencement 
of a long and bitter quarrel between him and 
Mr. Williams. The hostile feelings of both par- 
ties were often expressed in the strongest terms, 
and the most public manner, and seem to have 
continued unabated to the end of life, afford- 
ing a melancholy instance of the weakness of 
our nature, and the inadequacy even of com- 
mon interests and common sufferings to keep 
in subjection the evil passions of the human 
heart. How far Mr. Williams deserves to be 
blamed, either at the commencement or in the 
prosecution of this controversy, cannot now be 
determined. Yet, in a personal quarrel so bit- 
ter and so protracted as this proved to be, it 
seldom happens that the wrong lies wholly on 
one side of the question. It is probable that 
he allowed his feelings too much to affect his 
official conduct, and that severity and personal 
animosity were, perhaps, insensibly blended with 
his discharge of the duty, which belonged to 
him as a magistrate and a citizen. Cromwell 
was at this time too busily occupied, in settling 
the affairs of his immediate government, to give 
much attention to the petty seditions of a dis- 
tant colony, and no answer was ever returned to 
the question referred to him by the Court. The 
accusation brought against Harris was, accord- 
ingly, never prosecuted. 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 171 

While holding the office of President, Mr. 
Williams also made a series of efforts to estab- 
lish more amicable relations with the neighbor- 
ing colonies, and particularly with Massachusetts. 
She still asserted her jurisdiction over the people 
at Pawtuxet, a portion of whom acknowledged 
her authority, and thus occasioned incessant 
trouble to the authorities at Providence. The 
policy, which, from the beginning, she had pur- 
sued towards the settlements of Rhode Island, 
had become more and more vexatious and in- 
jurious, as their population increased and their 
interests multiplied. She allowed unrestricted 
commerce between her citizens and the people 
of every part of New England, the Dutch at 
New York, and even, to a considerable extent, 
with several of the tribes of Indians; but to the 
inhabitants of the heterodox colony she pre- 
scribed conditions and limitations, which op- 
erated gi-eatly to their disadvantage. Her laws 
forbade the people of Rhode Island from pur- 
chasing fire-arms or ammunition within her ju- 
risdiction, and she had repeatedly refused to 
relax anything in their execution, even when 
solicited, in the midst of imminent peril from 
the Indians, who, taking advantage of the 
unprotected condition of the colony, and her 
alienation from the other settlements of New 
England, constantly threatened her with petty 



172 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

annoyances, and sometimes even with fearful 
massacre. 

In the hope of changing this oppressive pol- 
icy. Mr. WilUams, on the 15th of November, 
1655, addressed a letter to ^' the General Court 
of magistrates and deputies assembled at Bos- 
ton," in which he earnestly remonstrated against 
a system of legislation, which brought so many 
grievances in its train, and by which the people 
of Rhode Island " seemed to be devoted to the 
Indian shambles and massacres." After a few 
months, he wrote a letter to the Governor of 
Massachusetts, and received from him, in return, 
an invitation to visit Boston, that he might pre- 
sent his requests to the General Court in per- 
son. He accordingly prepared an address, which 
he presented to the Court in the name of his 
colony, in which he set forth the evils and op- 
pressions which had been brought about by 
their cruel legislation. So earnest were his rep- 
resentations, and so unwearied was his perse- 
verance, that he at length succeeded in wringing 
from the stern and reluctant magistrates of the 
Bay some of the favors, which he sought for 
his fellow-citizens. These he immediately ac- 
knowledged in a brief note to the Assembly, 
full of expressions of gratitude and faithfulness 
to their service. 

This was the first time, since his banishment, 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 173 

that he had entered the territory of Massachu- 
setts by the permission of the authorities. On 
former occasions, when he had landed at Boston^ 
on his return from England, he was protected 
by an order from the Council; and once, when 
he had gone thither to embark, he was sub- 
jected to insult and molestation, as one who 
bore the name of outlaw. The invitation to 
visit Boston, sent to him by Governor Endicott, 
was the beginning of more amicable relations ; 
and, though his sentence of banishment was 
never formally revoked, yet his reception in 
Massachusetts seems to have been a practical 
disavowal, on the part of the authorities, of any 
intention longer to enforce its decree. 

In July of the year 1656, the first Quakers 
arrived at Boston. Deeply tinctured with the 
fanaticism of the age, the early representatives 
of this sect appear to have held in equal con- 
tempt the authority alike of the church and 
the state, and their fortunes in New England 
are admirably fitted to illustrate the amazing 
contrast between the spirit that ruled in Rhode 
Island, and that which animated the people 
and controlled the legislation of all the other 
colonies. No sooner had these new heretics 
landed in Massachusetts, than the guardians of 
the colony set themselves to accomplish their 
utter extermination. They were at first severe- 



174 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

ly punished under the general statutes against 
heresy. But, these proving ineffectual, the stern- 
est enactments were proclaimed against them. 
Heavy fines were imposed on any, who should 
bring Quakers into the colony, who should im- 
port any of their books, attend their meetings, 
or defend any of their heretical opinions. The 
Quakers themselves were to be whipped with 
twenty stripes, and kept at hard labor until they 
could be transported from the colony. These 
laws were subsequently made still more severe. 
Every Quaker who should return, after having 
been once banished, if a man, was to lose one 
ear ; if a woman, to be severely whipped ; and, 
after the second return, both men and women 
were to have their tongues bored through with 
a red-hot iron. The same punishment was also 
to be inflicted upon every one, who should em- 
brace their faith within the colony. The law 
was still inefTectual, and the "accursed and per- 
nicious sect" increased in spite of all the efforts 
of the authorities to suppress them, until, in 
October, 1658, a law was enacted, banishing 
them on penalty of death in case they should 
return. 

Similar laws, though generally not so severe, 
were also passed by the other colonies of New 
England ; and the commissioners of these colo 
nies employed every means of persuasion to 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 175 

induce Rhode Island to join in the general 
persecution. They twice addressed the General 
Assembly on the subject, urging them to with- 
hold from the Quakers the privileges of citi- 
zenship, and forbid them from taking up their 
residence within the jurisdiction. But the au- 
thorities of Rhode Island remained true to the 
principles on which their society was constituted. 
To both the communications, which were addressed 
to them, they returned a respectful but decided 
answer, that they had " no law whereby to pun- 
ish any for only declaring by words their minds 
and understandings concerning the things and 
ways of God, as to salvation and an eternal 
condition." They also, at the same time, ex- 
pressed their disapprobation of the doctrines of 
the Quakers, and their determination to require 
of them, as of all others who should come to 
their settlements, a strict performance of all 
civil duties ; " and, m case they refuse it, to 
make use of the first opportunity to inform the 
agent of the colony residing in England." 

The reply, however, was not satisfactory to 
the commissioners of the United Colonies, who 
appear to have been incensed at the firm and 
consistent policy pursued by the authorities of 
Rhode Island. The commissioners wrote a third 
time to the General Assembly, sternly threaten- 
ing that the colony should be excluded from 



176 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

all relations of intercourse and trade with the 
rest of New England, unless she immediately 
joined in their exertions to accomplish the ex- 
termination of the Quakers. But the tlireats of 
the commissioners were now as impotent as had 
been their arguments on former occasions. The 
colonists regarded with abhorrence these extra- 
ordinary attempts to drive them from their 
cherished principles, which had been distinctly 
recognized in their charter, and interwoven with 
all their legislation. Still, for the purpose of 
protecting themselves against the threats of their 
powerful and confederate neighbors, they deter- 
mined to appeal to the government in England. 
The General Assembly, at a meeting held at 
Warwick, in November, 1658, appointed a com- 
mittee to address a letter to Mr. Clarke, their 
agent at the court of the Protector, in which, 
after setting forth the measures which had been 
adopted by the other colonies, they formally ap- 
peal to his Highness and Council, that " they 
may not be compelled to exercise any civil 
power over men's consciences, so long as hu- 
man orders, in point of civility, are not cor- 
rupted or violated." 

Thus ended the controversy between the New 
England commissioners and the colony of Rhode 
Island, respecting the toleration of Quakers. It 
began near the close of the presidency of Mr. 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 177 

Williams, and was, doubtless, sustained on the 
part of the colony, in a great degiee, by his 
agency and advice. The mild and tolerant pol- 
icy, which she adopted, was in accordance with 
the principles in which he had laid the founda- 
tions of the commonwealth, and which had been 
incorporated into all her early legislation. It 
contrasts, in the happiest and most impressive 
manner, with that which was adopted by the 
other colonies of New England, and furnishes 
the most satisfactory evidence, that, amidst all 
the controversial excitements and irregularities 
of the times, the people of Rhode Island still 
cherished the "soul liberty," in the maintenance 
of which they had encountered the perils and 
hardships of the wilderness. From this liberal 
policy the colony was never induced to depart ; 
and her history, up to the present day, presents 
the rare, perhaps solitary instance of a state ex- 
isting for more than two hundred years, whose 
statute-book contains not a single law abridging 
the freedom of the conscience, or in any man- 
ner interfering with religious opinion or worship. 

VOL. IV. 12 



178 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY, 



CHAPTER XIV. 

He retires from the Presidency. — Charles the 
Second grants a new Charter to the Colony, 
— Williams appointed an Assistant in the 
Government, — His Labors for the Indians, — 
His Controversy with the Qiiakers. — King 
Philip^s War. — The Services of Williams 
during the War. — Its Results. — The Close 
of his Life, and his Death. 

In the preceding chapter we have narrated the 
principal events of the troubled period during 
which Mr. Williams occupied the post of Presi- 
dent, or Governor, of the colony of Rhode Island. 
He retired from the office in May, 1658, wheth- 
er by a voluntary withdrawal, or by a failure to 
secure the suffrages of his fellow-citizens, we 
cannot now determine. His experience in the 
office seems to have awakened no desire to 
continue in it or return to it. He never again 
aspired to the place of chief magistrate, though 
he was, a few years afterwards, elected a deputy 
from Providence, and repeatedly sat as an as- 
sistant, or member of the upper house of the 
colonial Assembly. He was also intrusted, by 
his fellow-citizens of Providence, with all the 
higher offices of the town, and especially with the 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 179 

performance of most of those public duties 
which required superior tact and wisdom. Af- 
ter this period, however, he seems never to have 
taken a very active part in the government of 
the colony, though he did not neglect any op- 
portunity, which his intelligent assiduity could 
employ, for promoting its interests or advancing 
the peace and social well-being of its people. 

From the year 1651, when John Clarke and 
Roger Williams were sent forth together in the 
service of the colony, Clarke himself had re- 
mained in England, the faithful and indefatiga- 
ble agent of the people of Rhode Island. On 
the restoration of Charles the Second, in 1660, a 
new commission was sent to him, urging him to 
prosecute his agency with the utmost diligence 
at the court of the restored monarch, whose 
views, it was feared, might be unfriendly to the 
interests of a colony, which owed its charter to 
the Long Parliament. At length, on the 8th of 
July, 1663, after a residence in England of 
eleven years, he had the happiness of receiving 
from the King a new charter for the colony, 
instituting a government clothed with more per- 
fect authority, and better suited to the condi- 
tion of the people, and still recognizing in full 
the same principle of unlimited freedom " in 
matters of religious concernments," on wnich 
the colony had been originally founded. The 



180 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

charter was brought to New England by Cap- 
tain George Baxter, and was presented to the 
General Court of Commissioners at Newport, on 
the 24th of November, 1663, and, on the fol- 
lowing day, was read in the presence of "a 
very great meeting and assembly of the free- 
men of the colony." It was received by the 
colonists with demonstrations of no common joy. 
The sum of one hundred pounds was voted 
to Mr. Clarke, their "■ trusty and well-beloved 
friend," and thirty pounds to " George Baxter, 
the most faithful and happy bringer of the 
charter." The ancient record glows with the 
animated scenes it describes. " The charter," 
says the record, ^'was taken forth from the 
precious box which held it, and was read by 
Baxter in the audience and view of all the 
people ; and the letters, with his majesty's royal 
stamp and the broad seal, with much beseem- 
ing gravity, were held up on high, and present- 
ed to the perfect view of the people."* 

In this instrument, the King, of his own au- 
thority, appointed the first Governor and assist- 
ants, who, according to its provisions, were to 
continue in office till the first Wednesday oi 
May next ensuing. Benedict Arnold was cre- 

* See Goddard's Mdress on the Occasion of tJie Change 
in the Civil Government of Rhode Island, p. 17 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 181 

ated Governor, and Roger Williams one of the 
assistants ; and at the first meeting of the Gen 
oral Assembly, under the new government, he 
was appointed to transcribe the charter into the 
permanent records of the colony. Immediate- 
ly on the organization of the new government, 
the prospects of the colony began to brighten. 
New energy was infused into all its members. 
In the following May, at the first general elec- 
tion held by the people, Mr. Williams was 
chosen an assistant, and, in connection with 
Mr. Clarke, was appointed to make a revision 
of the laws, that their requirements might be 
better understood and more thoroughly enforced. 
He was also appointed one of the commission- 
ers to run the eastern boundary of the colony, 
which had been the subject of a protracted dis- 
pute both with Plymouth and Massachusetts. 

The General Assembly, at the same time, in 
virtue of the additional importance given to the 
colony by the grant of a free charter, began 
to put forth a more decided authority, and to 
declare its decrees in a more peremptory tone, 
respecting the disturbers of the public peace, 
who still infested the settlements at Warwick 
and Pawtuxet. Amidst these new and happy 
auspices, the Assembly ordered that the word 
Hope be inscribed over the anchor, which had 
already been adopted as the device of the colo- 



182 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

nial seal, and the words " Rhode Island and 
Providence Plantations," the name given to the 
province m the new charter, be written around 
it, and that the same be henceforth the seal of 
the colony. 

Such were the circumstances in which the 
second charter of Rhode Island went into op- 
eration. It was the freest charter, that ever bore 
the signature of a King, and was the astonish- 
ment of the age in which it was granted. Like 
that which preceded it, it secured the most per- 
fect freedom in matters of conscience, and thus 
guarantied the perpetual exercise of the great 
principles on which the colony was founded. It 
continued to be the fundamental law of Rhode 
Island for nearly a hundred and eighty years, 
protecting the rights and securing the happiness 
of a long succession of generations, and " holding 
forth a lively experiment, that a most flourishing 
civil state may stand, and best be maintained, 
with a full liberty in religious concernments ; " 
and when it was supplanted, in 1843, by the 
present constitution of the state, it is believed to 
have been the oldest charter of civil government 
in the world. 

For a period of many years after the new 
organization of the government, but few memo- 
rials can now be found of either the public or 
the private life of Mr. Williams. As has been 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 183 

already mentioned, he was a deputy or repre- 
sentative from Providence, in 1667, and was 
chosen assistant again in 1670 and the follow 
ing year, and also in 1677; but in the last 
instance, he declined the office, probably on 
account of the infirmities of age. His name 
also frequently appears in the records of the 
town, as moderator of its meetings, as the lead- 
ing manager of public business, and especially 
as a member of most of the committees that 
w^ere appointed to draft public documents, to 
conduct negotiations with the Indians, or to set- 
tle the disputes and strifes that were perpetually 
springing up among the petulant burghers of that 
day, respecting the boundaries of their lands, or 
the limits of the town. 

He had now passed the meridian of his life, 
and had reached a period, when a man may 
well sequester himself from public affairs, and, 
amid leisure and repose, meditate the changes 
through which he has passed, and prepare for 
the still greater change that awaits him. But, 
though sharing little in the perplexities and toils 
of the government, he did not become indif- 
ferent to its prosperity or fame. He even 
ivatched with parental care over its interests, and 
was the author and adviser of many of the pub- 
lic measures of the time, with which his name 
does not now stand connected. He seems also 



184 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

to have been in the habit, during this more re- 
tired period of his Hfe, of going once in a 
month to the Narragansett country, the neighbor- 
hood where, many years before, he had kept a 
trading-house, for the purpose of preaching the 
gospel to the Indians, and the scattered English 
in those parts. And at a later day, when he 
was no longer able to leave his fireside, he 
wrote to Governor Bradstreet, of Massachusetts, 
to consult how he might print the sermons he 
had thus preached, for the benefit of the na- 
tives. 

Though his influence with the Indian tribes, 
and especially with the Narragansetts, was greater 
than that of any other person, yet he seems to 
have encountered nothing but difficulty and dis- 
couragement in his labors for their religious in- 
struction. They were singularly averse to the 
reception of Christianity ; and, though they would 
listen to the teachings of Mr. Williams from 
their respect for his character, yet the truths of 
the gospel found no easy access to their dark- 
ened understandings. Then, too, the amazing 
difficulty, with which spiritual ideas were ex- 
pressed in their rude and singular language, in 
itself presented an obstacle almost insurmount- 
able. He has himself declared how " hard it is 
for any man to attain a little propriety of their 
language in common things, so as to escape 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 185 

derision among them, in many years, without 
abundant conversing with them, in eating, trav- 
elhng, and lodging with them ; " and refers for 
proof to John EHot, who, though he had devoted 
his life to the study of their language and char- 
acter, could not always make himself understood 
when he taught them the truths of religion. 
Cotton Mather says of the Indian words, that 
they must have been growing in length from 
the confusion of tongues at Babel, and Mr. Wil- 
liams seems to have regarded the apostolic gift 
of tongues as alone adequate to the task of 
moulding their wild jargon into the clear ex- 
pression of spiritual truth. His pious and gen- 
erous-hearted labors, however, could not have 
been altogether in vain. He may have roused 
many a sluggish savage spirit to deep and earnest 
questioning of the mysteries of life, or planted 
the germs of virtue and piety in benighted 
minds, whose immortal destiny is known to God 
alone. 

In the summer of 1672, Mr. Williams engaged 
in his famous controversy with the Quakers. 
Like most other controversies of the kind, it was 
a profitless war of words, and has attached to 
his memory an odium, which the motives that 
led him to engage in it are far from justifying. 
These motives he states to have been, first, the 
vindication of the name of God from the dis- 



186 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

honor brought upon it by the Quakers ; secondly, 
to justify the colony for receiving them when 
banished from the other colonies ; thirdly, the 
hope that such a discussion would awaken " some 
soul-consideration " among the people, and thus 
save them from the errors he designed to ex- 
pose. 

The manners and modes of worship of the 
first advocates of the Quaker doctrines, who ap- 
peared in New England, were certainly suffi- 
ciently opposed to the purity of religion, and, in 
some instances at least, to the proprieties and 
decencies of civilized life. They excited the 
attention of the multitude by their noisy fervors, 
and sometimes wantonly provoked the persecu- 
tions they received. They scorned the ordinary 
courtesies of society, and gloried in rude man- 
ners and contemptuous expressions. The men 
would often insult the magistrates and ministers, 
as they passed their houses, and the women, 
laying aside the modesty of their sex, would 
run naked through the streets. Notwithstanding 
all this, they had been kindly received in Rhode 
Island, when driven from every other colony in 
New England, and were permitted to enjoy 
there every civil right and immunity, and, like 
all other citizens, to maintain undisturbed the 
peculiarities of their doctrine and worship. For 
this tolerant and truly magnanimous policy, this 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 187 

clear-sighted deference to the supremacy of con- 
science, the fair fame of the colony had been 
traduced, and her citizens had been represented 
as fostering and approving all the errors, which 
her legislation had tolerated. 

To the peculiar doctrines and practice of the 
early Quakers, Williams had always been strong- 
ly opposed. Though he never would allow them 
to be put down, or in any way molested, by the 
civil power, yet he regarded their notions as 
injurious to pure Christianity, and their conduct 
as pernicious to the morals and order of society. 
To declare his views respecting the prominent 
points of their belief, and to vindicate the col- 
ony from the aspersions which had been cast 
upon it for having received them to its juris- 
diction, as we have seen, were among the mo- 
tives which led him to engage in a controversy, 
which, though somewhat in accordance with the 
customs of that age, cannot now be regarded 
with approbation. In the month of July, 1672, 
he sent to George Fox, the distinguished founder 
of the sect, who was then at Newport, a formal 
challenge to a public discussion of fourteen prop- 
ositions, into which he had drawn out his views. 
The challenge was in these words, and was ad- 
dressed '' To George Fox, or any other of my 
countrymen at Newport, who say they are the 
apostles and messengers of Christ Jesus. In 



188 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

humble confidence of the help of the Most High, 
I offer to maintain, in public, against all comers, 
these fourteen propositions following, to wit ; the 
first seven at Newport, and the other seven at 
Providence. For the time when, I refer it to 
George Fox and his friends at Newport." The 
propositions that accompanied the challenge af- 
firmed, that the doctrines of the Quakers were 
unscriptural, and contrary to the well-being of 
society, and that, like Papacy, they tended to 
persecution, to rebellion, and to despotism. 
From some cause or other, they were not de- 
livered to Fox, immediately on being sent to 
Newport, and he left the colony without having 
seen them. Mr. Williams always suspected, 
though on what grounds is not precisely known, 
that this was the result of a collusion between 
him and his friends, who wished him to avoid 
a public defence of his principles. 

A discussion, however, was at length agreed 
upon, and was commenced at Newport, on the 
9th of August. Mr. Williams was then in the 
seventy-third year of his age ; yet was he able 
to row his boat, through a whole day, the dis- 
tance of thirty miles, from Providence to New- 
port, where he arrived, as he says, " towards 
midnight, before the morning appointed." Three 
members of the sect, which he had come to as- 
sail, appeared as champions against him. Their 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 189 

names were John Stubs, John Burnet, and Wil- 
liam Edmundson. The two former he speaks 
of as able and learned men ; the last, who was 
the chief speaker he characterizes as an ignorant 
and boisterous brawler. The debate began in 
the Quaker meeting-house, and lasted three days 
in Newport, and, on the 17th of the same month, 
was renewed at Providence, where it terminated 
after a single day, having produced no other 
effect than to exasperate the friends of both 
parties, and set them still more violently against 
each other. 

That portion of the debate, especially, which 
was held in Newport, appears to have been a 
scene of tumult and confusion. The novel 
gladiatorship attracted a crowd of spectators ; 
and, there being no moderator to preserve order 
and see fair play between the combatants, all 
took sides, and approved or condemned accord- 
ing to their varying tastes and opinions. Wil- 
liams complains that he was often rudely in- 
terrupted ; and when his brother Robert, at that 
time a schoolmaster in Newport, attempted to 
protect him from interruption, his interference 
was not allowed by the Quakers. Mr. Williams 
afterwards wrote out the discussion in full, which 
he published, together with an account of the 
motives that led to it, and the manner in which it 
was conducted. The book is entitled, " George 



190 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

Fox digged out of his Burrowes ; or, an Offer 
of Disputation on fourteen Proposals, made this 
last Summer, 1672, (so called,) unto G. Fox, 
then present on Pvhode Island, in New England, 
by R. W. ; " and, though displaying considerable 
learning, and a certain species of logical acute- 
ness, is distinguished by a bitterness and severity 
of language unequalled in any other of his 
writings. 

In the summer of 1675, the jealousies and 
hostilities, which had been so long gathering, in 
dark and threatening clouds, around the whole 
horizon of New England, broke out into a furious 
and desolating war. Philip, the able and am- 
bitious chief of the Pokanokets, had aimed to 
establish a league among the tribes around him, 
that thus he might be able to punish what he 
conceived to be the wrongs of his race, and, if 
possible, gain back the lands they had lost, and 
drive the English from the country. Mr. Wil- 
liams, as usual, in cases of trouble with the In- 
dians, had been employed to allay the fury of 
Philip and his tribe, and had exerted himself 
to the utmost to prevent the still powerful Nar- 
ragansetts from joining in the league. They 
at first promised neutrality, and renewed their 
treaty with the English ; but the remembrance of 
their ancient power, and especially of the mur 
der of their favorite chief, Miantonorno, v/as suf- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 191 

ficient to obliterate from their minds the obhga- 
tions of their treaty, and even their dread of 
Enghsh arms. They joined themselves to Philip, 
and their four thousand warriors rushed to the 
combat, that soon extended to every part of 
New England. Town after town was burnt, and 
the war spread dismay and distress to the homes 
of every settlement of the English, and for a 
time seemed to threaten the annihilation of the 
colonies. Many of the people of Providence, 
and of the other towns of Rhode Island, re- 
moved to Newport, with their families. 

Mr. Williams, however, remained at home, and 
was among the most active of the citizens in 
watching the movements of the foe, and prepar- 
ing for their attack. Though his age was up- 
wards of seventy-six years, yet he accepted a 
commission as captain in the militia of the col- 
ony, drilled the companies in Providence, and 
held them in constant readiness for active service. 
He also sent a petition to the town, for leave to 
convert one of the houses into a garrison, and 
to erect other defences " for security to women 
and children." The petition was granted, and 
the defences w^ere raised entirely at private ex- 
pense, for defraying which he subscribed the 
sum of ten pounds, by far the largest sum on 
the list of the subscriptions. At a subsequent 
period, the General iissembly estabUshed a garri- 



192 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

son at Providence, and placed it under the com- 
mand of Captain Fenner, with the express pro- 
vision in the orders that were given him, that his 
authority should '' not eclipse Captain Williams's 
power, in the exercise of the train-bands there." 
In spite, however, of the preparations for de- 
fence, Providence shared the fate of so many 
other towns in New England. It was attacked 
by the Indians on the 29th of March, 1676; 
twenty-nine houses were reduced to ashes, and 
among them that in which the town records 
were kept. The records themselves were par- 
tially destroyed, and the remaining portions were 
saved only by being thrown into a pond, from 
which they were afterwards recovered. It is 
said, in the ancient traditions of Providence, 
that, when the Indians appeared on the heights 
north of the town, Mr. Williams took his staff, 
and went forth to meet them, hoping to turn 
away their vengeance, as he had often done be- 
fore. But they were too much exasperated to 
yield to his influence. Some of the older chiefs, 
who had long known him, came towards him 
as they saw him approaching, and told him that 
they were his friends, but that their young men 
were too much enraged for him to venture among 
them with safety. He returned to the garrison, 
and witnessed the desolation of the town. This 
terrible war was at length brought to a close by 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 193 

the death of King Phihp, in August, 1676, but 
not till it had cost the colonies an immense ex- 
penditure both of treasure and blood. The dis- 
bursements and losses are said to have equalled 
half a million of dollars. Thirteen New Eng- 
land towns were entirely destroyed, and six 
hundred houses were burnt, and about six hun- 
dred of the colonists, or one in twenty of all 
the able-bodied men, were killed. There was 
mourning in every family, for every one had lost 
a kinsman or a friend. 

But to the Indians the war was productive 
of still more terrible results. Hunted down and 
driven from their hiding-places by the perse- 
vering energy of their more civilized foes, their 
bravest chiefs all slain or taken captive, they 
presented, at its close, but a feeble remnant of 
the proud race, who had defied the vengeance 
of the white men. The Pokanokets were en- 
tirely exterminated, and the Narragansetts were 
so crippled and reduced, that scarcely a hundred 
of them returned to occupy the deserted lodges 
of the tribe. The rest had all perished by the 
sword, by fire, or by famine, or had been taken 
captive by their conquerors. The body of King 
Philip was treated with shameful indignity; his 
head was severed from his body, and exposed 
on a gibbet at Plymouth, and one of his hands 

VOL. IV. 13 



194 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

was sent to Boston. The Indians who were 
taken captive in the war, including the son of 
King Phihpj the last of the race of Massasoit, 
were sold into slavery, either among the colo- 
nists at home, or in the Island of Bermuda. 
The captives, who were brought to Providence, 
were distributed among the heads of families on 
the following conditions, viz., '' All under Jive 
years to serve till thirty ; above five, and under 
ten, till tiventy-eight ; above ten, to fifteen, till 
twenty-seven ; above fifteen, to twenty, till twenty- 
six years ; from twenty to thirty, shall serve eight 
years ; all above thirty, seven years.^' These 
conditions were recommended by a committee 
appointed by the town to report a plan for 
the disposal of the captive Indians ; and, though 
the slavery to which they were reduced hardly 
involved the idea of absolute property in their 
persons, yet it is with pain and disappointment 
that we read the name of Roger Williams first 
among the committee who sanctioned them. 
Thus ended the history of the race he had so 
often befriended; and he may have regarded their 
servitude as the only condition compatible with 
the peace and safety of the colonies of New 
England. His hopes of their civilization and 
improvement were well nigh extinguished by the 
melancholy doom which settled around them, 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 195 

and which seems to be the inevitable fate of 
every savage race, when brought into colhsion 
with the arts and arms of civihzed man. 

Mr. Wilhams's life was now rapidly declining 
amid the shadows of evening, and but few more 
events remain to be recorded in its checkered 
history* Old age, however, to him was not a 
season of quiet and repose. He had devoted 
his life to the maintenance of one great prin- 
ciple ; and, though he had seen it embodied 
and carried into operation in the civil commu- 
nity around him, yet the principle was still a 
despised and persecuted one, and was regarded, 
even by the best and wisest men of New Eng- 
land, as the dream of enthusiasm. Its perma- 
nent triumph was yet to be secured. This 
made him exceedingly sensitive to any abuse of 
the freedom of conscience, which sprang up 
among the people of the colony. He was dis- 
quieted at their strifes and discords, and was 
constantly engaged in endeavoring to settle the 
questions that gave rise to them. After the 
close of the war, he seems still to have contin- 
ued his monthly visits to Narragansett, for the 
purpose of preaching to the English and the 
Indians, who dwelt there. 

In May, 1677, he was again chosen an assist- 
ant, but did not accept the office. In January, 
1681, he presented to the town a paper entitled 



196 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

"Considerations touching Rates," containing a 
series of maxims demonstrating the necessity of 
civil government, and the duty of every citizen 
to share in the burdens it imposes. The fact, 
that such considerations were needed, shows that 
the community, of which he was the founder, 
was still disturbed by those lawless and self- 
willed men, who are willing to enjoy all the 
blessings of regulated society, but shrink from 
every sacrifice it demands, and every labor it 
enjoins. With such men as these he had to 
contend as long as he lived ; and the latest 
recorded act of his life was to affix his signa- 
ture to a document, which was intended to settle 
the long-protracted controversy respecting that 
most prolific subject of disputes, the Pawtuxet 
lands. This document bears the date of Jan- 
uary 16th, 1683, and is the last that remains of 
the waymarks along the journey of his life. 
The precise time of his death is nowhere men- 
tioned. It must have occurred in the early part 
of the year 1683; for a letter written from Prov- 
idence on the 10th of May, by Mr. John Thorn- 
ton to the Reverend Samuel Hubbard, makes 
the following mention of his death ; " The Lord 
hath arrested by death our ancient and ap- 
proved friend, Mr. Roger Williams, with divers 
others here." 

This is the only record that can now bo 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 197 

found of the death of the venerable founder of 
Rhode Island. He was in the eighty-fourth 
year of his age ; and, though weakened by phys- 
ical infirmities, yet he seems to have possessed 
to the last the full vigor of his intellectual fac- 
ulties. He was buried at Providence, on the 
spot which he had selected as the burial-place 
of his family, with appropriate funeral honors, 
"and with all the solemnity the colony was 
able to show."* Though, like most of the 
early colonists, he lived to an age far beyond 
the ordinary lot of man, yet his wife, and all 
his children, are believed to have survived him. 



CHAPTER XV. 

His religious Opinions. — His Vieivs respecting 
the Clergy. — Political Opinions. — Character 
as a Writer. — General Remarks. 

In the preceding pages we have purposely 
avoided any account of the change in religious 
opinions, if such it deserves to be called, which 
has rendered the subject of this sketch so cele- 



* Callender, Elton's edition, p. 147, note. 



198 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY 

brated in the ecclesiastical annals of New Eng- 
land. Unfortunately, though much has been 
written, but little can now be known respect- 
ing it. As we have already stated, he received 
his ordination, as a minister of the gospel, from 
the hands of an Episcopal bishop of the estab- 
lished church in England, and, before leaving 
that country, was settled as a parish preacher. 
After his arrival in Massachusetts, like most of 
the other Puritan divines, he adopted the Con- 
gregational mode of worship and form of church 
government; and though, while there, he was 
charged with holding opinions " tending to Ana- 
baptistry," as it was called, yet the charge is 
supposed to have related to his principles of 
religious liberty, which were considered danger- 
ous and disorganizing, rather than to an adop- 
tion of the sentiments of the Baptists. The 
validity of infant baptism, and, indeed, of any 
baptism by sprinkling, was, at that period, just 
beginning to be called in question, among the 
Puritans, by here and there an inquiring spirit; 
and Roger Williams, though not the first to 
embrace the new opinions, yet, with his char- 
acteristic independence, was the first in New 
England to carry them out into practice. We 
know nothing of the reasons which led him to 
the step. We only know that he became con- 
vinced that his early baptism was invalid, and 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 199 

was baptized by immersion, according to the 
usage of the Baptists, in March, 1639, by Eze- 
kiel Holhman, a respectable citizen of Provi- 
dence. He subsequently administered the ordi- 
nance to Mr. Holliman, and to others of the 
settlers there, who immediately united in form- 
ing the First Baptist Church in that town, 
which was also the first of that persuasion 
upon this continent. 

But the doubt, which had been once awa- 
kened respecting the tenets of his early faith, 
unfortunately did not end with discarding his 
baptism when an infant. He soon became dis- 
satisfied with other institutions of the church, 
and especially doubted the apostolic authority 
of all the orders of the clergy then existing. 
This led him still further to distrust, and ulti- 
mately to reject, not only his own baptism, but 
all baptism whatever, " because not derived from 
the authority of the apostles, otherwise than by 
the ministers of England, whom he judged to 
be ill authority." * For these reasons, though, 
it appears, in a manner perfectly amicable, he 
left the church, which he had aided in forming, 
a few months after its organization, and became 
what, in the history of New England, is denom- 

* This is the language of Governor Winthrop, and with 
tliis view the writings of Williams agree. 



200 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

inated a Seeker; a term not inaptly applied to 
those, who, in any age of the church, become 
dissatisfied with its prevailing creeds and insti- 
tutions, and seek for more congenial views of 
truth, or a faith better adapted to their spiritual 
wants. He regarded all the churches of Chris- 
tendom as, in some sense, in a state of apostasy, 
and the clergy, of every name, as having fallen 
from their priestly office, and lost their true 
apostolic authority ; and he looked for a new 
commission to be given from Heaven, to restore 
the sacred succession of apostles, and reestab- 
lish, on their primitive basis, the ordinances of 
the gospel. 

His singular views on this subject are set 
forth at length in his writings, especially in his 
"HireUng Ministry none of Christ's." One of 
the propositions maintained in this work is, that 
" the apostolical commission and ministry is long 
since interrupted and discontinued. Yet, ever 
since the beast Antichrist arose, the Lord hath 
stirred up the ministry of prophecy, who must 
continue their witness and prophecy, until their 
witness be finished, and slaughters, probably, near 
approaching, be accomplished." This ministry 
of witnesses and prophets he recognized as the 
only one now extant. He allowed to them the 
right to bear witness to the truth, and to vindi- 
cate it from the attacks of all who should assail 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 201 

it; but he denied their authority to rule the 
church, or to administer the ordinances of re- 
ligion. 

These views respecting the ministry were, prob- 
ably, to a considerable extent at least, the result 
of his own unfortunate experience with the cler- 
gy of his time, both in England and America. 
He saw them, even in these most favored parts 
of Christendom, sanctioning the use of the civil 
sword, in maintaining the purity of the church, 
and in extending the triumphs of the gospel. 
He had himself suffered from their bitter de- 
nunciations, and had been a witness of their 
zeal for persecution; and, as he compared their 
practice with the qualities most insisted on in 
the sacred Scriptures, it is not strange that, 
with his views of the sanctity of conscience, he 
should be disposed to question their apostolic 
character and authority. 

These opinions, however, extraordinary as they 
now appear, did not abate an iota his interest 
in religious truth, or in the conversion of others 
to the Christian faith. With a zeal which never 
tired till near the close of a long life, "by 
many tedious journeys," he constantly labored 
for the religious good of the ignorant and the 
destitute around him ; and when too old to 
preach any longer, we find him by his fireside, 
strivinof to recollect the heads of his numerous 



202 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

discourses, that he might print them for the 
benefit of the Narrangansett Indians and others. 
For this purpose, he was obhged to apply to his 
friends for aid ; and, too poor himself to promise 
payment, he appeals to a nobler motive, and 
says that "he who hath a shilling, and a heart 
to countenance and promote such a soul-work, 
may trust the great Paymaster for an hundred 
for one in this life." * 

Still less did his peculiar views respecting the 
institutions and outward observances of religion 
diminish his faith in the fundamental principles 
of morals. In every sphere of life in which he 
moved ; in the controversies in which he was 
engaged ; in all his commerce with both civilized 
and barbarous men, he everywhere recognized 
them as matters of unchanging obligation. His 
adherence to what he regarded as the dictates 
of truth and justice, his generous respect for 
the rights of the Indians, and his philanthropic 
interest in their improvement, and conversion to 
Christianity, separate him from the great majority 
of the founders of states, and place him, in all 
the relations of equity and peace, by the side 
of the noble-minded William Penn. Even his 
worst enemies have never breathed a reproach 
upon his morals. Cotton Mather, who says, in 

* Letter to Governor Bradstreet. 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 203 

his quaint folly, that he had a windmill in his 
head, yet admits that he had the root of the 
matter in his heart ; while his friends, from a 
nearer observation of his virtues, pronounce him 
to have been "one of the most disinterested 
men that ever lived ; a most pious and heavenly- 
minded soul."* 

The record of his life, and of the labors in 
which he was engaged, is perhaps the best de- 
lineation of his character. Of its minuter per- 
sonal traits it may now be difficult to form any 
distinct conception. Its leading features appear 
to have had their origin in his steadfast love of 
truth, and his boldness and independence in 
declaring it. It may have been wanting in the 
graces and accomplishments, which cultivated life 
alone can impart ; but it was still radiant with 
some of the noblest and most commanding qual- 
ities of humanity. His faults were such as gen- 
erally spring from an ardent and excitable temper- 
ament. He was sometimes hasty and rash in 
forming his opinions, and too unyielding and 
uncompromising in maintaining them. But that 
he was also magnanimous and benevolent, pa- 
tient of suffering and forgiving of injuries, and 
unwavering in his devotion to the interests of 
truth, and liberty, and virtue, his whole life bears 

* Callender, p. 72. 



204 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

constant testimony. He could not be a time- 
server or a parasite. He could fawn neither 
at the footstool of power nor at the tribunal of 
public opinion. He was true to the promptings 
of his own moral nature, and he followed them, 
with reverence, whithersoever they led him. 

His political opinions were, in the main, those 
of the Puritans and the Independents; though 
he stopped far short of the extremes to which 
some of the leaders of the popular party pushed 
their principles, in the fierce contests of that 
revolutionary age. On but few of the great 
questions, which then agitated England, has he 
left any expression of his opinion. The scenes 
of his life were too remote and too humble to 
render it necessary, or even possible, for him 
to take any decided stand in the general politics 
of the day. But, though sympathizing strongly 
with the popular party, and on terms of friendly 
intimacy with many of its most eminent leaders, 
yet he could not sanction some of its measures ; 
and, amid all the changes in the government, 
he never withheld his allegiance from the con- 
stituted authorities of the realm, whether Par- 
liament, Protector, or King. He has declared, 
in one of his writings, his disapprobation of the 
execution of Charles the First, and seems seri- 
ously to have doubted whether it would not 
have been better to suffer all the evils of tyr- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 205 

anny, rather than plunge the nation into the 
calamities of the civil wars. 

His industry in every enterprise which he un- 
dertook was indefatigable. His life was one 
long season of incessant work, and this in nearly 
every sphere of exertion which the times pre- 
sented. He placed the highest estimate upon 
the value of time. " One grain of its inesti- 
mable sand," says he, " is worth a golden moun 
tain ; " and it was only in the spirit of such 
a maxim, that he could have accomplished so 
much, both of intellectual and physical labor, 
in the unpropitious circumstances in which he 
was placed. His knowledge, especially in history 
and theology, appears to have been extensive, 
and his scholarship in the classic languages un- 
usually varied and exact. As a writer, he had 
little time, and, it may be, little taste for the ele- 
gances of language. His style, however, is usu- 
ally earnest and forcible, and sometimes sparkles 
with animating beauty, though it more generally 
rolls roughly along through sentences involved 
and wearisome from their want of clearness and 
harmony. But when we reflect, that much of his 
time was spent away from cultivated society, in 
providing for the mere physical necessities of life, 
amid the depressions of poverty, and the hard- 
ships of an infant settlement, as he himself 
describes it, '• at the hoe and at the oar for 



206 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

bread," our wonder is, that he was able to write 
so much, and especially to write so well ; and 
we pardon the rudeness of his style, as we think 
of the noble principles of spiritual freedom it 
embodies, and of the toils and sufferings he en- 
dured in making them familiar to mankind. 

But it is not upon his writings that the fame 
of Roger Williams most depends, or that his 
claims to the respect and gratitude of the world 
principally rest. His name, especially in this 
country, has long since become identified with 
the great principle of political philosophy, which 
he spent the greater part of his life, and his 
best energies, in supporting and carrying into 
practice. This principle of the supremacy of 
conscience, the underived independence of the 
soul, now so familiar and well understood, was, 
in the age in which he lived, a startling par- 
adox, and, in the judgment of his contempo- 
raries, prolific only of evils both to the church 
and the state. He alone conceived it in its true 
import and application, and he fearlessly an- 
nounced it as an elemental truth in morals. 
Starting with the great doctrines of the refor- 
mation, the right of private judgment, and man's 
accountability to God alone for his religious 
faith and worship, he demonstrated his sublime 
principle. To set it forth, to vindicate it from 
the persecutions with which it was assailed, to 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 207 

rescue it from the selfish ends to which it was 
perverted, this was the noble mission of his life, 
to which he sacrificed comfort and ease, and all 
his hopes of worldly preferment. In the pursuit 
of this end he never wavered. In public and 
in private life, as a minister and a legislator, 
amid the rudeness and penury of his plantation 
in the wilderness, or in the society of scholars 
and statesmen in the mother country, he kept 
it constantly in view, as the radiant pole-star of 
his hopes and aims. 

His days were passed amid the obscurity of 
a New England settlement, a sphere too narrow 
and humble to call out the full energies of his 
character. Had he returned, like Sir Henry 
Vane, to England, he might have asserted his 
noble principles on the floor of the British Par- 
liament, or uttered them at the Board of the 
Council of State. His influence could not fail 
to be felt, and his name might have stood, on 
the page of English history, among the brightest 
and best of the republican statesmen of the 
time. But he was reserved for a less con- 
spicuous, though scarcely an humbler destiny, 
to become the founder of a state in the American 
confederacy, and the first advocate, in modern 
Christendom, of the entire freedom of conscience. 
The truths for whose sake he was persecuted 
and banished, and which he toiled so long to es- 



208 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

tablish, have become incorporated into our whole 
social system, and, hke many of the most useful 
arts, from their very commonness and familiarity, 
have now ceased to remind us of their original 
discoverer and advocate. But he, who analyzes 
our American civilization, and traces the influ- 
ences that now control it back to the sources 
whence they sprang, will not fail to appreciate 
the character, and do honor to the name, of 
Roger Williams. 



APPENDIX 



No. I. 

Charges against Rhode Island. 

Two several charcres have been brouo-ht against 
Rhode Island, for having trespassed upon the prin- 
ciples of religious liberty in which she was originally 
founded. The first is contained in Chalmers's " Po- 
litical Annals," Book I. Chap. XI. pp. 276-279. 
He states, that, at the meeting of the General As- 
sembly, in March, 1664, a law was passed, contain- 
ing the following passage; viz., "That all men p7'o- 
fessing Christianity, of competent estates, and of civil 
conversation, who acknowledge and are obedient to 
the civil magistrates, though of different judgments 
in religious affairs, Roman Catholics only excepted, 
shall be admitted freemen, or may choose or be 
chosen colonial officers." A statute, containing the 
passage above quoted, is found in the edition of the 
"Laws of Rhode Island," which was printed in 1745, 
the earliest edition, of which any copies are now ex- 
tant. But it is certain, that no law containing the 
clauses written in Italics, was passed in 1664; nor 
can such a law now be found at all in the records 

VOL. IV. 14 



210 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

of the colony. The late Honorable Samuel Eddy, 
who was Secretary of State, in Rhode Island, from 
1797 to 1819, and who examined the records with 
the utmost care, and with reference to this very ex- 
clusion, states that he found nothing relating to it, 
" nor anything that gives any preference or privileges 
to men of one set of religious opinions over those 
of another." 

The words printed in Italics are now generally re- 
garded as an interpolation, and are supposed to have 
been inserted, at a date long subsequent to 1G64, 
by some committee for the revisal of the early laws, 
or by some friend of the colony, who thus sought to 
rescue its reputation, in England, from the odium 
which might have been attached to the toleration of 
Roman Catholics, and those who were not Christians. 
This supposition is rendered in a high degree prob- 
able, by the considerations, that such an exclusion 
conflicts with the principles of Roger Williams, and 
with the whole spirit of both the charters and all the 
early legislation of the colony ; that no such ex- 
clusion was ever carried into effect in the colony; 
and, lastly, that the identical law, the excluding 
clauses being removed, was actually passed by the 
General Assembly, in 1664, in which Roger Wil- 
liams sat as an assistant, or member of the upper 
house. For the views of Mr. Eddy, drawn out in 
full, see Walsh's "Appeal," pp. 427-435. 

The other charge is contained in an article signed 
Francis Brinley, (Massachusetts Historical Collec- 
tions, Vol. V.,) which asserts, that, in 1665, the 
Quakers were outlawed for refusing to bear arms 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 211 

This statement, however, turns out to be as destitute 
of truth as the preceding. The origin of the charge 
is explained, and its falsity clearly pointed out, in 
an article, also from the pen of Mr. Eddy, contained 
in the Mass. Hist. Coll. 2d Series, Vol. VII. p. 97. 
From this article it appears, that, in 1665, the com- 
missioners of the colonies, in the name of the King, 
ordered that all householders, inhabiting the colony 
of Rhode Island, should take the oath of allegiance. 
The General Assembly, however, replied that it had 
always been the practice of the colony, out of re- 
spect to the rights of conscience, to allow those, 
who objected to the taking of an oath, to make a 
solemn asseveration, on the penalties of perjury. An 
engagement was accordingly drawn up, which, in 
obedience to the authority of the King, the inhab- 
itants of the colony were required to take, or lose 
their privileges as freemen. By the terms of the 
engagement, the individual promised to bear alle- 
giance to the King and his successors, and " to 
yield due obedience to the laws established from 
time to time." To this latter clause the Quakers 
took exception, because it would require them to 
comply with the militia laws then in being. They 
refused to take the engagement, and were accord- 
ingly disfranchised ; a result which formed no neces- 
sary part of the purposes of the law, and which is 
to be ascribed rather to the order of the commis- 
sioners, than to the action of the legislature. The 
form of the engagement was altered the next year, 
on purpose to suit the scruples of the Quakers. 
Such is the manner in which these charges, brought 



212 



AMERICAN BIOGllAPHY. 



against the fidelity of Rhode Island to the princi- 
ples of her founder, have been answered and refuted, 
by a gentleman who was perfectly acquainted with 
the spirit of her institutions and the history of her 
'egislation. 



No. 11. 

Account of Roger Williams's Writings. 

The titles of but few of the writings of Roger 
Williams have found their way into any of the larger 
bibliographical works of our language. Many of them 
are, consequently, now exceedingly rare, and seldom 
accessible to the general reader. On this account, 
the following description of those, which are known 
to exist, is presented to the attention of readers who 
may be curious in such things. 

I. His earliest published work bears the following 
title; *' A Key into the Language of America, or an 
Help to the Language of the Natives in that Part of 
America called New England ; together with briefe 
Observations of the Customs, Manners, and Worships, 
&c., of the aforesaid Natives, in Peace and Warre, in 
Life and Death. On all which are added spiritual 
Observations, generall and particular, by the Author, ol 
chiefe and special Use (upon all Occasions) to all the 
English inhabiting those Parts ; yet pleasant and prof- 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 213 

itable to the View of all Men. By Roger Williams, 
of Providence, in New England. London, printed 
by Gregory Dexter, 1643." 

This work was written vhile at sea, on his first 
voyage to England, in the summer of 1643, as a 
help to his own memory, that he might not lightly 
lose what he " had so dearly bought by hardship and 
charges among the barbarians." It comprises one hun- 
dred and ninety-seven pages of small duodecimo, and 
is dedicated to his " well-beloved countrymen in Old 
and New England." It is divided into thirty-two 
chapters, each of which is devoted to some subject 
connected with the manners and character of the 
Indians, and contains specimens of the principal words 
in their language which relate to that subject. Each 
chapter, also, closes with pious reflections, and a few 
verses, which compare very well with productions of 
most of the New England bards of that day. The 
" Key " is by far the best known of Mr. Williams's 
works, and is still of the highest authority respecting 
the subject of which it treats. A few copies of the 
original edition still remain, and are occasionally no- 
ticed in the catalogues. The greater part of the work 
has been republished in the third and fifth volumes 
of the Massachusetts Historical Society's Collections. 
It is also contained entire in the first volume of the 
Collections of the Rhode Island Historical Society. 
A copy of the original edition is in the library of 
Harvard College. 

II. The second work which Mr. Williams pub- 
lished is entitled, " Mr. Cotton's Letter, lately printed, 
Examined and Answered. By Roger Williams, of 



214 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

Providence, in New England. London, imprinted in 
the year 1644." It is a small quarto, of forty-seven 
pages, preceded by an address, of two pages, to " The 
Impartiall Reader." From this address, it appears 
that, soon after the banishment of Williams, Mr. 
Cotton sent him a letter, in which he vindicates the 
act of the magistrates in sending him away, though 
he denies that he had any agency in procuring it. 
The letter also states the opinions of Mr. Williams, 
which led to his banishment, and points out " the 
sandiness of the grounds " on which they rested. Of 
this letter, the work above mentioned contains a full 
examination and refutation. Its tone is highly cour- 
teous, and the dilemmas in which it often places Mr. 
Cotton show the clearness, with which Mr. Williams 
had conceived his opinions, and " the rocky strength 
of the grounds " on which he planted them. The 
work is now exceedingly rare. The copy I have ex- 
amined is in the possession of the family of the late 
Moses Brown, of Providence. There is also a copy, 
somewhat mutilated, in the library of Yale College. 

III. His next publication is entitled, ''The Bloody 
Tenent of Persecution, for Cause of Conscience, dis- 
cussed, in a Conference between Truth and Peace, 
who, in all tender Affection, present to the High 
Court of Parliament (as the Result of their Dis- 
course) these (amongst other Passages) of highest 
consideration." It was printed in London, in 1644, 
without the name either of the writer or the publish- 
er, and comprises two hundred and forty-seven pages, 
of small quarto. In the library of Brown Universi- 
ty are two copies of the work, which appear to 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 215 

be of separate editions, though both printed within 
the same year. There is a slight difference in the 
type and orthography of the title-page, and of the 
captions of some of the chapters. The earlier copy 
also contains a list of errata at the end, which are 
corrected in the later edition. In all other respects 
ths two copies are precisely alike. 

The singular origin of the work well illustrates 
the spirit of the times. A person, who had been con- 
fined in Newgate for opinion's sake, wrote a letter 
against the use of the civil power in cases of con- 
science. The letter was written with milk, on sheets 
of paper brought to the prison by stealth, as stoppers 
to the milk-bottle. After its publication, it was sent to 
Mr. Cotton, of Boston, who wrote an answer to the 
views it contained. This answer to what was thus 
written in milk, in support of the mild and benignant 
doctrines of toleration, is represented as written in 
blood, and is hence styled by Williams *' The Bloody 
Tenent." Both the letter from Newgate and the an- 
swer of Mr. Cotton are printed in the work, and form 
the basis of the dialogue between Truth and Peace. 
The whole is prefaced by a Dedication to the " Right 
Honorable, both Houses of the High Court of Par- 
liament," and by an "• Address to every Courteous 
Reader." The work was written during the author's 
first visit to England, and though, as he says, prepared 
for the public " in change of rooms and corners, 
yea, sometimes, in variety of strange houses, some- 
times in the fields in the midst of travel," it is yet 
the best written of all his works, and sets forth his 
doctrines of religious freedom very fully, and in a 



216 AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. 

style always animated, and sometimes highly beauti- 
ful. It has never been republished, and copies are 
now seldom offered for sale, though, when offered, 
they always command a high price. There is a copy 
of this work in the library of Harvard College. 

Mr. Cotton wrote a reply to this work, which was 
published in 1647, and was entitled, "The Bloody 
Tenet Washed and made White in the Blood of the 
Lamb, being discussed and discharged of Blood-guilt- 
yness, by just Defence." The author contended for 
the right and the duty of the civil magistrate to 
punish for errors of doctrine, and endeavored to vin- 
dicate the practice at that time so prevalent among 
the settlements of the Puritans. 

IV. Mr. Williams's fourth publication was a re- 
joinder to this work of Mr. Cotton's. It has the 
following title-page, which is sufficiently descriptive 
of its contents; *'The Bloody Tenent yet more 
Bloody, by Mr. Cotton's Endeavor to wash it white 
in the Blood of the Lambe, of whose precious Blood 
spilt in the Blood of his Servants, and of the Blood 
of Millions spilt in former and later Wars for Con- 
science' Sake, that most Bloody Tenent of Persecution 
for Cause of Conscience, upon a second Tryal, is now 
found more apparently, and more notoriously guilty. 
In this Rejoynder to Mr. Cotton are principally, 1. The 
Nature of Persecution ; 2. The Power of the Civil! 
Sword in Spiritualls examined; 3. The Parliament's 
Permission of dissenting Consciences justified. Also 
(as a Testimony to Mr. Clarke's Narrative) is added 
a Letter to Mr. Endicott, Governor of the Massachu- 
setts, in N. E. By R. Williams, of Providence, in 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 217 

New England. London, printed for Giles Calvert, 
and are to be sold at the Black Spread Eagle, at 
the West End of Paul's, 1652." It is a small quarto, 
and, including the letter to Governor Endicott, and 
an appendix to the clergy of Old and New England, 
Scotland, and Ireland, comprises three hundred and 
twenty pages. This work discusses the same great 
questions as the preceding, and maintains the same 
views, with additional arguments. Both are pervaded 
with a mildness quite unusual in the controversial 
writings of that day, and are enriched with an amount 
of learning that does credit to the varied scholarship 
of their author. This second work is believed to be 
even more rare than the first. There are two copies 
in the library of Brown University, one of w^hich is 
the presentation copy, which Mr. Williams gave to his 
friend and fellow-laborer in the service of the colony, 
Dr. John Clarke. It contains the following inscrip- 
tion, in his own hand-writing; "For his honored 
and beloved Mr. John Clarke, an eminent witness 
of Christ Jesus ag'st ye bloodie Doctrine of Perse- 
cution, &c." There is likewise a copy in the library 
of Harvard College. 

V. In the same year, in which he wrote the Re- 
joinder to Mr. Cotton, and while he was on his 
second visit to England, he also wrote and published 
another treatise on the same general subject as the 
two preceding. It is entitled, "The Hireling Minis- 
try None of Christ's, or a Discourse touching the 
Propagating the Gospel of Christ Jesus ; Humbly pre- 
sented to such Pious and Honorable Hands, whom 
the present Debate thereof concerns. By Roger Wil- 



218 



AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY, 



Hams, of Providence, in New England. London, 
printed in the Second Month, 1652." This book is 
also a small quarto, of thirty-six pages. It is, in real- 
ity, an argument against an established church, and 
the support of the clergy by law, and not, as its title 
would now seem to import, against the pecuniary 
compensation of ministers of the gospel. It is a sort 
of supplement to his other writings on religious lib- 
erty, in which he explains his singular views respect- 
ing the ministry, and earnestly contends for the right 
of " all the people of the three nations to choose and 
maintain what worship and ministry their souls and 
consciences are persuaded of" Only two copies of 
this work are known now to exist in this country, 
and these are both in the library of the American 
Antiquarian Society at Worcester. One of them has 
been lent to the writer, by the courtesy of the di- 
rectors of that institution. 

VI. He is also said to have published, during the 
same year, while residing in England, another small 
volume, entitled, " Experiments of Spiritual Life and 
Health, and their Preservatives. London, 1652." I 
am not aware that any copy of this work now exists 
"n this country, nor is there any account given of it 
:'n any of the ordinary works of bibliography. 

VII. The last of Roger Williams's published wri 
i,lngs is the account of the controversy he had with 
vhe Quakers. It was printed at Boston, in 1676, 
and bears the following title ; " George Fox digg'd 
out of his Burrowes, or an Offer of Disputation, on 
fourteen Proposalls made this last Summer, 1672, 
(so call'd,) unto G. Fox, then present on Rode 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 219 

Island, in New England, by R. W. As also how 
(G. Fox slily departing,) the Disputation went on, be- 
ing managed three Dayes at Newport on Rode Island, 
and one Day at Providence, between John Stubbs, 
John Burnet, and William Edmundson, on the one 
Part, and R. W. on the other. In which many Quota- 
tions out of G. Fox and Ed. Burrowes Book in Folio 
are alleadged. With an Appendix, of some Scores of 
G. F., his simple lame Answers to his Opposites in 
that Book quoted and replyed to, By R. W. of Provi- 
dence in N. E. Boston, printed by John Foster, 167G." 

The book derives its quaint title from the acci- 
dental combination of the names Fox and Burrowes 
in the work, which had been written in defence of 
the Quakers. It also contains a number of similar 
puns upon these names, scattered through the dis- 
cussion. Like most of his other writings, it is in 
small quarto, and comprises, in all, three hundred and 
twenty-seven pages, of which two hundred and eight 
are devoted to an account of the controversy, and 
one hundred and nineteen to the Appendix. It is 
dedicated to ''The King's Majesty, Charles II.," and 
commences with two prefatory addresses, one to " The 
People called Quakers," and the other " To those 
many Learned and Pious Men, whom G. Fox hath so 
sillily and scornfully answered in his Book in Folio. 
Especially to those whose Names I have been bold 
to mention in the Narrative and Appendix, Mr. Rich- 
ard Baxter, Mr. John Owen, &c." 

Though written at a late period of life, when, in 
most men, the fires of passion have burned out, it is 
yet the most violent and denunciatory of all his wri- 



220 



AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY, 



tings. The manner in which the discussion at New- 
port was managed was exceedingly irritating and 
harassing, and the recollection of this seems to have 
remained in his mind, and to have infused its bit- 
terness into the narrative in which he has embodied 
his arguments. The book has never been repub- 
lished. A copy of it is contained in the library of 
Harvard College. 

Roger Williams appears to have written several 
other works, which either were never published, or 
have long since perished. Among these was the 
Treatise he wrote while at Plymouth, respecting the 
patent granted by King James to the New England 
colonies. This was the book which occasioned him 
so much trouble during his second residence at Sa- 
lem. There is no reason to believe that it was ever 
published. In his "Key to the Indian Languages," he 
speaks of having " further treated of the natives of 
New England, and that great point of their con- 
version, in an additional Discourse." This Treatise, 
which may have been printed, has probably perished 
No trace of it can now be found. He also, near 
the close of his life, prepared for publication a vol- 
ume of the sermons he had preached at Narragansett, 
and wrote to Governor Bradstreet to solicit aid in 
printing it. The volume, however, seems never to 
have gone to the press. 

I have thus mentioned all the works of Roger 
Williams, which are now known to be extant, or of 
which any account has been preserved. They were 
regarded with little favor, on this side of the Atlan 
tic, at the time of their publication, on account of 



ROGER WILLIAMS. 2"21 

the general hostility of the Puritans to his doctrines 
of religious freedom, and to the interests of the col- 
ony which he founded. Most of them were originally 
printed in London, and it is not improbable that 
many more copies of them all may now be found 
in Great Britain than in this country. It is to be 
hoped, however, that, of the few that remain, a com- 
plete set may yet be collected for some one of the 
public libraries of Rhode Island. 

In addition to those works, which were prepared 
specially for publication, there is a large number of 
letters and documents relating to both public and 
private affairs. Many of these have been published 
in the early volumes of the Massachusetts Historical 
Collections, and also in Mr. Knowles's Memoir. 
Others are scattered about in the possession of indi- 
viduals, or in places of public deposit. Of the pub- 
lished letters, that written, in 1G70, to Major Mason, 
of Connecticut, is by far the most interesting and 
valuable, and contains the fullest account, which he 
has left on record, of the period of his banishment, 
and his planting the settlement at Providence. No 
one can read it without admiring the simplicity of 
the narrative, or without feeling a lively sympathy 
for the perils he encountered, and the sufferings he 
endured. 



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